بررسي ويژگي هاي دموگرافيك و باليني در بيماران سرپايي مراجعه كننده به درمانگاه چندتخصصي درد بيمارستان سينا، تهران

A study on demographic and clinical characteristics of out¬patients attending a multi- disciplinary pain clinic

Background: This study was done to investigate demographic and clinical characteristics of patients attending a multi-disciplinary pain clinic. Materials and methods: A retrospective study on the questionnaires completed by consecutive new patients presenting to the pain clinic was performed and the results were analyzed statistically. Results: Most of the patients had a prolonged history of chronic severe pain. A great majority of patients had previous physieian visits and were taking medications at the time of presentation to pain clinic but only a small proportion of them had experienced improve¬ment. One-sixth of patients had been operated upon because of pain. The mean average pain score was higher in older patients and among female attendees. The degree of interference of pain with daily activities was lower in the older and the female patients. The degree of interference with social, recreational and familial activities was lower among patients in spousal relationship and in more educated ones, but was positively related to increasing age. Conclusion: The findings of this study show that many factors including age, gender, marital status and education may influence different aspects of pain, whieh should be taken into consideration in the management of patients in pain