Comparison of Visual Analog Scale and Indiana Polyclinic Combined Pain Scale as Pain-Assessment Tools among General Practitioners in Indonesia

: There are numerous pain assessment tools available, with no clear superiority between them. Among those tools are Visual Analog Scale (VAS) and Indiana Polyclinic Combined Pain Scale (IPCPS). VAS is often used in assessing pain while IPCPS is a new tool and has more descriptive items for documenting pain. This study is to know which pain-assessment tool is more preferred by physicians and whether there is correlation between VAS and IPCPS. Fifty one Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation Residents in Universitas Indonesia, were enrolled in this cross-sectional study. They were asked to fill-in the questionnaire. Forty subjects (78,4%) preferred VAS than IPCPS to assess patient’s pain although 40 subjects stated IPCPS is more accurate in describing patient’s pain. The subjects reasoned they are more familiarized with VAS and spend less time to complete it. On the other hand, IPCPS has more detailed descriptions on pain and its ascociation to the patients’ activities. There is moderate correlation between VAS and IPCPS score (r = 0,78). VAS is more preferred to assess patient’s pain as it is more familiar and need less time to be done, but IPCPS has more items in describing pain.