Studies with different types of visual analog scales for measurement of pain

Publisher Website
Google Scholar
Abstract
The sensitivity of different types of visual analog scales and of descriptive pain terms were compared in healthy volunteers and in postoperative patients. Volunteers (107) marked visual analog scales according to their perception of the descriptive pain terms-little, mild, some, moderate, severe and agonizing. Individual variation in values and preferences between the five following 5 different visual analog scales were analyzed: 10-cm linear horizontal and vertical scales; a curvilinear scale; and graded horizontal and curvilinear scales. Significantly more volunteers preferred the horizontal scale with gradations. Scores for the vertical linear scale had the greatest coefficient of variation and were least normally distributed. The majority of volunteers considered the phrase agonizing pain the best term defining the extreme limit of pain .**GRAPHIC**. = 41.8, P < 0.001). There were significant changes in the values of pain intensity measured on visual analog scales by patients using the same descriptive pain term on successive observations. The patients'' values for pain terms in the preoperative pain-free state were not significantly different from those during postoperative pain. Graded linear horizontal scales are evidently both more reliable and preferred by participants and visual analog scales give a more sensitive and accurate representation of pain intensity than do descriptive pain scales.

This publication has 5 references indexed in Scilit: