Thai Short-form McGill Pain Questionnaire.

Objective: To validate the Thai Short-Form McGill Pain Questionnaire (Th-SFMPQ).

Material And Method: A postal survey to find the most corresponding terms to those used in the original English short-form McGill Pain Questionnaire had been performed The Thai version was created and validated. Sixty patients who had either musculoskeletal or neuropathic pain were assessed by two interviewers with this Th-SFMPQ.

Results: Forty four women and sixteen men participated in this study. Average age was 44.3 +/- 12.8 years and 80% of them had musculoskeletal pain. Means of sensory score was 8.98, affective score was 5.73, total score was 14.71, total count was 7.33, Present Pain Intensity (PPI) was 3.21 and Visual Analog Scale (VAS) was 53.61. Cronbach's a value was 0.7881 and inter-rater validity value of PPI was more than 0.7. The correlation coefficient was quite high (r > 0.8) for all scales. Regarding content validity, three pain descriptors (ie. stabbing, gnawing, and splitting) did not meet 33% in Melzack's criteria.

Conclusion: The Th-SFMPQ has good internal consistency and inter-rater validity. Three uncommon descriptors should be substituted by other words or discarded in later version.