Does the addition of Patient-Reported Outcome Measure Information System (PROMIS) pain instruments improve the sensitivity of PROMIS upper extremity scores after arthroscopic rotator cuff repair?

Background: Although Patient-Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System (PROMIS) Upper Extremity (P-UE) has been validated in upper extremity orthopedics, its ability to capture a patient's functional recovery after arthroscopic rotator cuff repair (aRCR), as measured by its responsiveness, is minimal in the early postoperative period. The primary purpose of this study is to determine if the addition of PROMIS Pain Intensity (P-Intensity) or Pain Interference (P-Interference) scores to PROMIS UE improves the responsiveness throughout the 1-year postoperative period after aRCR.

Methods: This prospective, longitudinal study included 100 patients who underwent aRCR. Patients completed P-UE, P-Interference, P-Intensity, American Shoulder and Elbow Surgeons, and Western Ontario Rotator Cuff Index scores preoperatively and at 2 weeks, 6 weeks, 3 months, 6 months, and 12 months after surgery. Responsiveness at each time point relative to preoperative baseline and 1-way analysis of variance with post hoc analysis was conducted for each PROM. The responsiveness of the outcome score was determined using the effect size, graded as small (0.2), medium (0.5), or large (0.8). The Pearson correlation coefficient (r) was determined between these instruments at each time point.

Results: In isolation, P-UE, P-Interference, and P-Intensity showed a medium-large ability to detect change (positive and negative) throughout the 1-year postoperative period. The addition of PROMIS pain scores to P-UE improved the responsiveness of the instrument (from medium to a large effect size) starting at 3 months and continued throughout the 12-month follow-up period. Although the addition of pain scores increases the response burden for PROMIS, this was still lower than the response burden for the legacy outcome scores (P < .05).

Conclusion: The addition of PROMIS pain instruments improves the responsiveness of the P-UE function score in patients undergoing aRCR.