Purpose
To investigate which Korean pain descriptors are frequently used in the patients with musculoskeletal disorder and compare the frequency of Korean pain descriptor according to pain disorder, gender, age, and pain intensity and pattern.
Material and Method
The study was retrospectively conducted for the 242 patients (72 men, 170 women; mean age, 59.1 years; range, 20-83 years) who visited the outpatient clinic due to musculoskeletal pain between January 2019 and June 2019. The patients were asked to fill out a questionnaire for their musculoskeletal pain. The questionnaire included the pain location, subjective pain description, pain intensity using numeric rating scale (NRS), and pain duration and pattern. The Korean pain descriptors were classified ‘Alida’, ‘Ssusida’, ‘Jjileum (stinging)’, ‘Dang-gida (pulling)’, ‘Ugsinhada’ etc), and compared according to diagnostic pain disorders (shoulder, back, neck, knee pain), gender (male, female), age (under 65, 65 years or older), pain intensity (mild: NRS 1-3, moderate: 4-6, severe: 7-10), and pain pattern (continuous, intermittent)..
Result
Total 24 Korean pain descriptors were recorded, and ‘Alida’ was the most frequent pain descriptor with 89 cases, followed by ‘Ssusim (48)’, ‘Jjileum (22)’, ‘Dang-gim (16)’, ‘Ugsin (14)’, and others (53). When the patients were classified according to their pain diagnosis, shoulder pain was the most common disorder (153 cases), followed by back pain (33), knee pain (31), and neck pain (25). ‘Alida’ was the most frequent pain descriptor in all disorders. In the patients with shoulder pain, the second most frequent pain descriptors was ‘Ssusim (36)’, followed by ‘Jjileum (17)’, and ‘Ugsin (10)’. In the patients with back pain, the second most frequent pain descriptors was ‘Ssusim (5)’, followed by ‘Dang-gim (4)’ and ‘Jjileum (3)’. In the patients with knee pain, the frequency of pain descriptor was followed by ‘Ssusim (5)’ and ‘Dang-gim (3)’, and in the patients with neck pain, followed by ‘Dang-gim (4)’, ‘Ssusim (2), and ‘Jjileum (2)’. There was a significant difference of pain descriptor frequency among the four pain disorders (p<.05) (Figure 2).
When the frequency of pain descriptors was classified according to age (p=.21), gender, (p=.42), pain intensity (p=.45), and pain pattern (p=.48), there was no significant difference between/among the groups
Conclusion
The pain descriptor expressing musculoskeletal pain in Korean varied widely and ‘Alida’ is the most frequent Korean pain descriptor regardless of pain disorder, age, gender, pain intensity and pattern. The frequency of Korean pain descriptors showed a significant difference according to pain disorders. However, the frequency of Korean pain descriptors showed no significant difference according to age, gender, and pain intensity and pattern.
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Table 1. Frequency of Korean Pain Descriptors for Musculoskeletal Pain
Figure 1. Among Korean pain descriptors, ‘아림’ was the most frequent pain descriptor, followed by ‘쑤심’, ‘찌름’, ‘당김’, ‘욱신’, and others.
Figure 2. There was a significant difference of pain descriptor frequency among the four different pain disorders (p<.05).
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