Demographic and clinical characteristics of free-text writers in chronic pain patient intake questionnaires

Figures & data

Table 1. Sample characteristics of those with free-text vs. those without

Sociodemographics	Free-text	No free-text	Chi-square/t-statistic
Sample size	295 (80.4%)	72 (19.6%)
Education			1.27
High school or less	152 (53.3%)	42 (60.9%)
Some college or higher	133 (46.7%)	27 (39.1%)
Currently employed	106 (36.3%)	29 (40.3%)	0.39
Marital status			0.54
Married or common law	45 (60.3%)	173 (63.4%)
Widowed, separated, or divorced	64 (22.3%)	13 (18.3%)
Single/never married	50 (17.4%)	13 (18.3%)
Sex			2.90
Male	115 (39.0%)	36 (50.0%)
Female	180 (61.0%)	36 (50.0%)
Age^a	54.12 (14.98)	56.63 (14.20)	1.23
Canadian born^b	266 (91.4%)	61 (84.7%)	0.09
Pain characteristics
Number of sources of pain^a	6.66 (4.64)	4.63 (3.23)	−4.35***
Pain location cluster			8.89**
Widespread pain cluster	124 (42.8%)	17 (23.6%)
Localized pain cluster	166 (57.2%)	55 (76.4%)
Duration of pain condition (months)^a	123.24 (129.36)	68.09 (72.63)	−4.51***
Usual past week pain^a	6.67 (2.01)	6.77 (1.68)	0.417
Had other painful conditions in the past	169 (66.3%)	34 (52.3%)	4.36*
Accident-related pain	64 (22.5%)	14 (19.7%)	0.61
Pain interference (past 24 h)^a	50.42 (17.81)	45.91 (18.10)	−1.83
Pain Catastrophizing Scale^a	27.35 (13.30)	27.95 (13.15)	0.32
Health care utilization
Gone to emergency room for pain condition^c	144 (49.5%)	28 (38.9%)	2.60
Been hospitalized for pain condition^c	48 (16.7%)	7 (9.7%)	2.18
Number of alternative treatments tried^a	4.53 (3.22)	3.68 (3.19)	−2.02*
Have accessed any type of alternative treatment	270 (92.5%)	61 (85.9%)	3.05
Number of tests undergone (e.g., X-ray)^a	2.24 (1.30)	1.74 (1.16)	−2.92*
Number of specialists seen^a	4.32 (2.39)	3.20 (2.09)	−3.89***
Number of past medications tried^a	3.16 (2.39)	2.05 (0.95)	−4.81***
Number of current medications^a	6.46 (3.68)	5.00 (3.73)	−2.81*
Mental health
Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (continuous depressive score)^a	12.42 (6.86)	11.89 (7.04)	−0.57
Meets cutoff for clinically significant depression (15 or higher)^a	106 (37.2%)	23 (34.3%)	0.19
Severity of depressive scores			0.55
No/minimal symptoms	42 (14.8%)	12 (17.9%)
Mild symptoms	67 (23.7%)	15 (22.4%)
Moderate symptoms	68 (24%)	17 (25.4%)
Severe symptoms	106 (37.5%)	23 (34.3%)

Numbers represent descriptives among those who used free-text (cross-tabulations).

^aValues represents M (SD) and t-statistic.

^bDue to small cell sizes, participants’ country of origin was categorized into Canadian born or other.

^cVariable captures pain-related lifetime without a specific time frame for hospital or emergency visits (i.e., “Have you ever been to the emergency room for your pain?” and “Have you ever been hospitalized for your pain?”).

*P < 0.05, **P < 0.01, ***P < 0.001.