Assessment of pain after SCI in clinical trials

Abstract

Even though over one third of persons with spinal cord injury (SCI) report significant pain and individuals may have as many as five pain sites, the treatment of pain has received relatively little attention in the SCI literature. One factor related to this may be the lack of consensus about appropriate pain measures. We review measures of the various aspects of pain and pain treatments used in the field of pain medicine and assess their usefulness in SCI pain trials based on existing literature. We conclude that sufficient knowledge on SCI pain and its measurement exists to make progress in treatment trials possible. © 2006 Thomas Land Publishers, Inc.