BACKGROUND The severity and course of spinal pain is poorly understood in adolescents. The study aimed to determine the prevalence and two-year incidence, as well as the course, frequency, and intensity of pain in the neck, mid back, and low back (spinal pain). METHODS This study was a school-based prospective cohort study. All 5th and 6th grade students (11-13 years) at 14 schools in the Reg...

The current study examines how subjective pain reporting is influenced by the concordant and discordant nature of the ethnic identities of pain expressers (participants) and pain assessors (experimenters). Three discomfort conditions that varied in stimuli intensity (Study 1: mild pain; Study 2: severe pain), and distraction components (Study 3) were used to assess whether pain intensity and to...

OBJECTIVE Studies have consistently shown that long-term meditation practice is associated with reduced pain, but the neural mechanisms by which long-term meditation practice reduces pain remain unclear. This study tested endogenous opioid involvement in meditation analgesia associated with long-term meditation practice. METHODS Electrical pain was induced with randomized, double-blind, cross...

Acute and chronic pain is a common experience in children and youth. A thorough assessment is fundamental to understand this experience and to assess and monitor treatment responses. The intensity of pain is the parameter most commonly assessed. In this article, we describe the different methods employed to assess pediatric pain intensity and review well-validated and commonly used self-report ...

Existing laboratory-based research in adult samples has suggested that anxiety sensitivity (AS) increases an individual's propensity to experience pain-related anxiety, which in turn enhances pain responsivity. Such relationships have not been examined in younger populations. Thus, the present study used structural equation modeling (SEM) to test a conceptual model in which AS would evidence an...

it is widely believed that pain has a profound effect on health related quality of life. this study was conducted to assess quality of life in patients suffering from different density of chronic low back pain. the sample consisted of 101 patients with chronic low back pain attending to the rheumatology research center of tehran university of medical sciences between july and september 2003. al...