title: Acute pain assessment tools: let us move beyond simple pain ratings.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  This review highlights challenges and current trends in tools used to assess acute pain across the lifespan.
  
  
  RESULTS
  A plethora of similar assessment tools exist for acute pain, most focused on self-report of pain intensity. Attempts to improve the frequency and visibility of pain assessment by prompting pain as 'the fifth vital sign' resulted in unintended consequences, creating a pressing need for a conceptual shift to multidimensional assessment of acute pain.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Valid and pragmatic assessment of pain is essential for effective pain management. Unidimensional scales that capture self-reported pain intensity ratings undervalue to the complexity of the pain experience. Pain is a biopsychosocial experience and assessment is a complex social transaction and an exchange of the meaning of pain that demands a more comprehensive approach.
authors.affiliation: Integrated Pain Care Program, Department of Anesthesiology and Pain Medicine Harborview, Seattle, Washington, USA.
authors.forename: Debra B
authors.initials: DB
authors.lastname: Gordon
mesh_terms: D059787:Acute Pain / Q000175:diagnosis*; D006801:Humans; D059408:Pain Management; D010147:Pain Measurement / Q000379:methods* / Q000639:trends