Pain-Related Fear and Its Disabling Impact in Hypermobile Adolescents With Chronic Musculoskeletal Pain.

Study Design Cross-sectional study. Background Chronic musculoskeletal pain (CMP) has a negative impact on physical functioning. During adolescence, joint hypermobility is a potential risk factor for developing CMP, and pain-related fear contributes to the persistence of CMP. Whether pain-related fear and hypermobility are related, and even reinforce each other, resulting in a stronger association with perceived level of disability, is still unknown. Objectives To evaluate whether pain-related fear has a stronger association with disability in hypermobile compared to nonhypermobile adolescents with CMP. Methods The study included 116 adolescents with CMP. The presence of hypermobility was assessed using the Beighton score. Measures of pain intensity, age, sex, and pain-related fear were collected and included in the multivariable model. Hierarchical regression analysis, with disability as the dependent variable, was used to examine the interaction between hypermobility and pain-related fear. Results Hypermobile adolescents with CMP do not have more pain-related fear compared to nonhypermobile adolescents with CMP. There was no interaction effect between hypermobility and pain-related fear in explaining disability (β = .20, P = .42). Similarly, perceived harmfulness of balance-related activities was not more strongly associated with disability in hypermobile adolescents with CMP. Conclusion The association of pain-related fear with the perceived level of disability is not more pronounced in hypermobile compared to nonhypermobile adolescents with CMP. J Orthop Sports Phys Ther 2017;47(10):775-781. Epub 12 Sep 2017. doi:10.2519/jospt.2017.7282.