2Epidemiology of chronic musculoskeletal pain
Section snippets
Prevalence or incidence?
Before describing the epidemiology of chronic musculoskeletal pain, it is useful to briefly consider the different measures that are used to report rates. Musculoskeletal pain is difficult to accurately measure and study. While shoulder, low back and chronic widespread pain are common (see below), these symptoms often have a poorly defined onset. The first ever episode may have occurred early in childhood, the timing of which is difficult to recall – indeed, the best predictor of a new episode
The prevalence of musculoskeletal pain
There is a paucity of data on the rate of musculoskeletal pain in adolescents. Table 1, Table 2 summarize the results of those studies available. It is clear that the reported prevalence of pain differs markedly between studies. For example, reports of low back pain range from 8%3 to 44%4, while the prevalence of chronic widespread pain has been reported to lie between 1%5 and 15%.6 These differences in reports of pain prevalence are, at least in part, a consequence of the different definitions
Age and gender
Studies of pain in children and adolescents have found that the prevalence of musculoskeletal pain increases with age and is particularly prevalent amongst adolescents.33 A 4-year prospective study reported that the occurrence of new-onset low back pain increased with age from 12.5% in subjects aged 12 years to 24.1% in those aged 15 years.8 A study examining the prevalence of chronic pain (regardless of location) in children and adolescents (age birth to 18 years) reported that prevalence
Conclusion
The prevalence of musculoskeletal pain varies greatly across studies. This is probably due to a number of factors, including the different definitions of pain used. There are also a number of measurement issues which make it difficult to draw comparisons. Many of the studies examining pain in adolescents have only examined the occurrence/non-occurrence of pain, and have not examined duration, frequency or intensity. Furthermore, the majority of epidemiological studies of musculoskeletal pain
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank Barbara Nicholl for her help preparing the tables.
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