Comparison of patient and surgeon assessments of pain in oral and maxillofacial surgery.

Pain perception is a physical sensation interpreted in the light of experience and is influenced by a great number of interacting factors. Clinicians are constantly required to combine subjective and objective information to determine optimal treatment of pain. In this study, the authors prospectively compare patients' subjective complaints of pain using the visual analog scale to the surgeons' assessment of pain using standard history and physical examination findings.