Outcome Measure
Pain Self-Efficacy Questionnaire
What it measures?
- The beliefs held by people experiencing chronic pain that they can carry out certain activities even when experiencing pain.
Who is it for?
Adults aged 18 years +
Instrument Quality
- The PSEQ is widely used and recommended for use in multidisciplinary pain programs. A systematic review confirmed that the PSEQ possesses good construct validity and correlates negatively with measures of disability, pain interference, anxiety, depression and catastrophising (Dube, Roy & Langevin, 2021).
Structure
- 10 items
- 7-point Likert scale
- Respondents are asked to read 10 statements and rate how confident that they are in being able to do the activity (0 = "Not at all confident"; 6 = "Completely confident") reflected in each statement (e.g. “I can enjoy things despite pain”)
Scoring instructions
Sum all item responses to derive a full-scale score
| Subscale | Item number |
|---|---|
Full-scale (PSEQ) |
1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10 |
Score Interpretation
What higher scores mean?
- Higher scores are desirable and indicate higher levels of confidence to perform activities despite pain (i.e. pain self-efficacy)
How to assess symptom severity & change?
| Description | Score Range | |
|---|---|---|
| Severe | 0 | |
| Moderate | 20 | |
| Mild | 31 | |
| Minimal | 41 |
Instrument developers
- Nicholas MK. The pain self-efficacy questionnaire: Taking pain into account. Eur J Pain. 2007 Feb;11(2):153-63. doi: 10.1016/j.ejpain.2005.12.008. Epub 2006 Jan 30. PMID: 16446108
Refrences
* Dubé MO, Langevin P, Roy JS. Measurement properties of the Pain Self-Efficacy Questionnaire in populations with musculoskeletal disorders: a systematic review. Pain Rep. 2021 Dec 21;6(4):e972. doi: 10.1097/PR9.0000000000000972. PMID: 34963996; PMCID: PMC8701870 * Nicholas MK, Costa DSJ, Blanchard M, Tardif H, Asghari A, Blyth FM. Normative data for common pain measures in chronic pain clinic populations: closing a gap for clinicians and researchers. Pain. 2019 May;160(5):1156-1165. doi: 10.1097/j.pain.0000000000001496. PMID: 30694928.
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Severity ranges
Cutoff values and labels (minimal, mild, moderate, severe) recommended in reference manual for the Electronic Persistent Pain Outcomes Collaboration (ePPOC)
Reliable change and clinically significant improvement
A systematic review evaluated four studies and calculated a weighted mean for the Standard Error of Measurement (Dubé, Langevin & Roy, 2021). The minimal detectable change with a 95% confidence interval was 11.52 out of 60 points (range 3.41-11.52). The reference manual for the Electronic Persistent Pain Outcomes Collaboration (ePPOC) recommends that clinically significant change is indicated where there is a change of 7 or more points, coupled with a move to a different level of impairment.
Reliability