Association between catastrophizing, postoperative pain, and injury severity in soldiers injured during the first year of the war in Ukraine

Aims: The aim of this study was to investigate the associ-ation between catastrophizing, postoperative pain, and in-jury severity following war-related injuries among soldiers injured during first year war in Ukraine. Methods: This cross-sectional included 135 patients with treated at Center Thermal Trauma Reconstructive Surgery Vinnytsia re-gional University hospital Ukraine August 2022 November 2022. Following surgical treatment, patients’ catastrophizing assessed using Ukrainian version Pain Catastrophizing Scale (UA-PCS) correlated pain levels numerical rating scale (NRS), scores obtained Injury Severity Score (ISS) Combat Exposure (CES). poten-tial pre-existing traumatic events a participant’s lifetime were Life Events Checklist for DSM-5 (LEC-5). Results: Multiple regression analyses showed no significant association PCS total score demographic variables age, gender, marital status, education, duration military service, or time from injury. Only 3.6% variance accountable contribution independent variables. We found moderate positive correlation catastroph-izing (including all subscales) NRS, ISS, CES scores. account 43.4% variability Previous traumat-ic did not contribute Conclusion: Our describes be-tween sustained injuries, combat expo-sure, pain. Since our sample consists that young healthy before suffering major polytrauma, offers unique perspective, different other previous studies which investigated ci-vilian population.