Doctor of Philosophy / Despite the demonstrated efficacy of cognitive-behavioural therapy for chronic pain, recent research has attempted to identify predictors of treatment outcome in order to improve the effectiveness of such treatments. This research has indicated that variables such as the nature of the onset of the pain and psychopathology are associated with poor adjustment to chronic pain. Accordingly, these variables might also be predictive of poor response to treatment. Individuals who experience a sudden onset of pain following an injury or accident, particularly when the instigating event is experienced as psychologically traumatic, may present for treatment with high levels of distress, including symptoms consistent with a posttraumatic stress response. The impact of this type of onset of pain and posttraumatic stress symptoms on adjustment to chronic pain and treatment outcome is the focus of this thesis. Three studies were conducted to clarify and extend earlier research findings in this area. Using 536 patients referred for treatment in a tertiary referral pain management centre, the first study examined the psychometric properties of a widely used self-report measure of posttraumatic stress symptoms (the PTSD Checklist, or PCL), modified for use in a chronic pain sample. This study provided preliminary support for the suitability of the PCL as a self-report measure of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) symptoms in chronic pain patients. However, the study also highlighted a number of issues with the use of self-report measures of posttraumatic stress symptoms in chronic pain patient samples. In particular, PCL items enquiring about symptoms which are a common aspect of the chronic pain experience (e.g. irritability, sleep problems) appeared to contribute to high mean scores on the PCL Avoidance and Arousal subscales. Furthermore, application of diagnostic cut-off scores and an algorithm recommended for the PCL in other trauma groups suggested that a much larger proportion of the sample was identified as potentially meeting diagnostic criteria for PTSD than would have been expected from previous research. The second study utilised the modified PCL to investigate the impact of different types of onset of pain (e.g. traumatic onset) and posttraumatic stress symptoms on adjustment to chronic pain in a sample of 196 chronic pain patients referred to the same centre. For patients who experienced the onset of pain related to a specific event, two independent experts in the field of PTSD determined whether these events satisfied the definition of a traumatic event according to DSM-IV diagnostic criteria. Adjustment was assessed through a number of validated measures of mood, disability, pain experience, and pain-related cognitions. Contrary to expectations, comparisons between patients who had experienced different types of onset of pain revealed few significant differences between them. That is, analyses comparing patients presenting with accident-related pain, or pain related to other specific events, to patients who had experienced spontaneous or insidious onset of pain revealed no significant differences between the groups on measures of pain severity, pain-related disability, and symptoms of affective distress after adjustment for age, pain duration, and compensation status. Similarly, comparisons between patients who had experienced a potentially traumatic onset of pain with those who had experienced a non-traumatic or spontaneous or insidious onset of pain also revealed no significant differences on the aforementioned variables. In contrast, compensation status, age, and a number of cognitive variables were significant predictors of pain severity, pain-related disability, and depression. The final study investigated the impact of type of pain onset and posttraumatic stress symptoms on response to a multidisciplinary cognitive-behavioural pain management program. Unlike the previous study, this treatment outcome study revealed a number of differences between onset groups. Most notably, patients who had experienced an insidious or spontaneous onset of pain reported greater improvements in pain severity and maintained these improvements more effectively over a one month period than patients who had experienced pain in the context of an accident or other specific incident. There was also limited evidence that improvements in depression favoured patients who had experienced an insidious or spontaneous and non-traumatic onset of pain. Consistent with this, posttraumatic stress symptoms were a significant predictor of treatment outcome, with higher levels of symptoms being associated with smaller improvements in pain-related disability and distress. Notably, this study also revealed that certain cognitive variables (i.e. catastrophising, self-efficacy, and fear-avoidance beliefs) were also significant predictors of treatment outcome, consistent with previous findings in the pain literature. This provided some perspective on the relative roles of both PTSD symptoms and cognitive variables in adjustment to persisting pain and treatment response. These findings were all consistent with expectations and with previous research. Implications for future research and for the assessment and treatment of chronic pain patients who present with posttraumatic stress symptoms are discussed.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ADTP/269560 |
| Date | January 2008 |
| Creators | Tadros, Margaret |
| Publisher | Medicine. Anaesthesia and Pain Management., University of Sydney. |
| Source Sets | Australiasian Digital Theses Program |
| Detected Language | English |
| Rights | The author retains copyright of this thesis., http://www.library.usyd.edu.au/copyright.html |
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