Refinement and partial validation of the UNESP-Botucatu multidimensional composite pain scale for assessing postoperative pain in horses.

BACKGROUND

Quantification of pain plays a vital role in the diagnosis and management of pain in animals. In order to refine and validate an acute pain scale for horses a prospective, randomized, blinded study was conducted. Twenty-four client owned adult horses were recruited and allocated to one of four following groups: anaesthesia only (GA); pre-emptive analgesia and anaesthesia (GAA,); anaesthesia, castration and postoperative analgesia (GC); or pre-emptive analgesia, anaesthesia and castration (GCA). One investigator, unaware of the treatment group, assessed all horses at time-points before and after intervention and completed the pain scale. Videos were also obtained at these time-points and were evaluated by a further four blinded evaluators who also completed the scale. The data were used to investigate the relevance, specificity, criterion validity and inter- and intra-observer reliability of each item on the pain scale, and to evaluate construct validity and responsiveness of the scale.

RESULTS

Construct validity was demonstrated by the observed differences in scores between the groups, four hours after anaesthetic recovery and before administration of systemic analgesia in the GC group. Inter- and intra-observer reliability for the items was only satisfactory. Subsequently the pain scale was refined, based on results for relevance, specificity and total item correlation.

CONCLUSIONS

Scale refinement and exclusion of items that did not meet predefined requirements generated a selection of relevant pain behaviours in horses. After further validation for reliability, these may be used to evaluate pain under clinical and experimental conditions.