Ecological Momentary Assessment of Non-Menstrual Pelvic Pain: Potential Pathways of Central Sensitization in Adolescents and Young Adults with and without Primary Dysmenorrhea

Figures & data

Table 1 Demographic and Menstrual History Characteristics

	Control Group (n=53)	PD Group (n=39)	P value	Total (n=92)
Age (years)	20.7 (1.8)	21.1 (2.1)	ns	20.8 (2.0)
Ethnicity			0.011
Hispanic/Latino	8 (15.1)	15 (38.5)		23 (25.0)
Non-Hispanic/Non-Latino	45 (84.9)	24 (61.5)		69 (75.0)
Race			ns
White	21 (39.6)	20 (51.3)		41 (44.6)
Black/African-American	3 (5.7)	5 (12.8)		8 (8.7)
Asian	28 (52.8)	14 (35.9)		42 (45.7)
American Indian/Alaska Native	1 (1.9)	0 (0.0)		1 (1.1)
Average menstrual pain rating	0.7 (0.8)	7.1 (1.7)	0.000	3.4 (3.4)
Age at menarche (years)	12.2 (1.4)	11.9 (1.2)	ns	12.1 (1.3)

Note: Data presented as mean (SD) for continuous variables and N (% of group) for categorical variables.

Abbreviations: PD, primary dysmenorrhea; ns, not significant.

Figure 1 Study enrollment flow diagram.

Table 2 Group Differences in Text Message and NMPP Data

	Control Group (n=53)	PD Group (n=39)	P value	Total (n=92)
Length of participation (days)	84.8 (38.7)	69.3 (28.7)	ns	78.3 (35.5)
Min	22	25		22
Max	171	143		171
Median	80	66		70
Response rate (%)	97.7 (6.2)	99.4 (1.6)	ns	98.4 (4.9)
Min	72.6	91.7		72.6
Max	100.0	100.0		100.0
Median	100.0	100.0		100.0
NMPP-Ip	1.60 (1.0)	2.00 (1.3)	0.003	1.87 (1.2)
NMPP-Ia	0.04 (0.29)	0.17 (0.66)	0.000	0.09 (0.47)
NMPP-%	3.1 (5.2)	8.7 (10.7)	0.004	5.5 (8.4)
Min	0.0	0.0		0.0
Max	27.3	40.7		40.7
Median	1.2	4.3		2.5

Abbreviations: PD, primary dysmenorrhea; NMPP, non-menstrual pelvic pain; Ip, mean NRS value for all painful non-bleeding days; Ia, mean NRS value for all non-bleeding days; NMPP-%, percentage of days during which the participant was not menstruating that she reported experiencing any level of pelvic pain.

Table 3 Breakdown of Numbers of Total Days and Non-Bleeding Days During Which Participants Received and Responded to Text Messages

	Control Group (n=53)	PD Group (n=39)	Total (n=92)
Total no. of days participants enrolled and receiving text message	4496	2703	7199
No. of days answered	4408	2683	7091
No. of days un-answered	88	20	108
No. of non-bleeding days that a text was answered	3581	2123	5704
No. of answered non-bleeding days with NRS=0	3493	1946	5439
No. of answered non-bleeding days with NRS>0	88	177	265
N (%) of days that were rated
1–3	84 (95.5)	161 (91.0)	245 (92.5)
4–6	3 (3.4)	14 (7.9)	17 (6.4)
7–10	1 (1.1)	2 (1.1)	3 (1.1)

Abbreviations: PD, primary dysmenorrhea; NRS, numeric rating scale.

Figure 2 Histogram of NMPP-% distribution within the whole sample.

Figure 3 Histograms of NMPP-% distribution within the control group (A) and PD group (B).

Figure 4 Example of cycle demonstrating low-level pelvic pain across the menstrual cycle.