Unanswered and uncounted items of the illness behavior questionnaire count: a comparison between patients who answered all the items in the questionnaire and those who left one or more items unanswered in a pain management program.
OBJECTIVE
This study aimed to understand the significance of unanswered and uncounted items on the illness behavior questionnaire (IBQ) in the setting of the Mayo Clinic pain management program for patients with chronic pain.


METHODS
Three hundred and seventy-eight patients who completed the questionnaire were studied. The data included (1) age, (2) IQs, (3) IBQ score profiles, (4) litigation status, (5) admission status (inpatient vs outpatient), and (6) dismissal status ("graduates" vs "dropouts").


RESULTS
Comparison between patients who answered all the items (n = 272) and those who left one or more items unanswered (n = 106) showed a significant difference in the completion rate of the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale ( P < 0.05), Scale 5 (affective disturbance) score (P < 0.05), and the rate of dropout from the program (P < 0.05). Also, those who dropped out of the pain management program had a significantly lower score on Scale 5 (P < 0.001) and a significantly greater number of unanswered items that were not counted toward the scale score (P < 0.05).


CONCLUSIONS
Unanswered and uncounted items of the IBQ seem to count toward a better understanding of patients' pain behavior.
Sato
H
H
Department of Anesthesiology and Critical Care Medicine, Saga Medical School, 5-1-1 Nabeshima, Saga 849-8501, Japan.
Maruta
T
T
Totoki
T
T