Numerous instruments have been developed for the measurement of
pain with various clinical populations. This study was designed to compare
pain measures for research in a sample of postoperative patients. The Brief
Pain Inventory--Short Form (BPI-SF) was administered along with the Short-Form McGill
Pain Questionnaire (SF-MPQ) and two visual analogue scales, one for
pain while at rest (VAS-R) and one for
pain upon movement (VAS-M), in random order,
to 115 hospitalized patients twice following their surgery. An additional 29 patients completed the instruments once. Correlations between the visual analogue scales, BPI-SF, and SF-MPQ ranged from .33 to .76 (p < .01), suggesting that the instruments measure different aspects of
pain and that instructions can influence the results. Recommendations for the selection of
pain measures in patients experiencing
acute pain and for future research are described.