BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: The pain self-management program (PSM) includes education about pain, training to identify and change negative thinking, establishment of goals, relaxation exercises and physical therapies aiming at decreasing pain and improving mood and psychosocial functioning. This study aimed at evaluating the methodological performance and the feasibility of studying PSM effectiveness to treat chronic pain in the elderly and, secondarily, at evaluating its effectiveness as compared to a control educational method. METHOD: Social-demographic aspects, chronic pain and its evaluation, impact on functionality, quality of life, cognition and emotion were evaluated using: socio-demographic evaluation, pain visual analog scale (VAS), Geriatric pain measurement (GPM), Katz and Lawton scales (functionality evaluation), mental state mini exam (MSME), Geriatric Depressive Scale (GDS) and SF-36. RESULTS: Participated in this study 20 females (12 in the G1/intervention and 8 in G2/control groups), mean age of 73.7 in G1 and of 78.2 in G2. Mean pain intensity in the beginning of the study was 18.6 mm in G1 and 16.6 mm in G2, when VAS was used, and 21.8 in G1 and 19.7 in G2 with GPM. At the end of the study, mean pain intensity according to VAS was 16.7 mm for G1 (p = -.342) and 41.2 for G2 (p = 0.006). GPM scores were 19.7 for G1 (p = 0.400) and 25.8 for G2 (p = 0.346). Katz scale scores were 5.8 in the beginning and 5.9 at the end of the study for G1 and 5.4 in the beginning and 5.6 at the end for G2 (p = 0.198). Lawton scale showed statistically significant functional improvement for G1 (p = 0.040), the same not being true for G2 (p = 0,148) with significant difference between groups (p = 0.032). Mean values obtained with SF-36 were not statistically significant between groups. CONCLUSION: PSM intervention has improved functional independence of the elderly for daily life activities and has shown a trend to decrease intensity and improve quality of pain.
Elderly; Management; Pain; Treatment
