The Emerging Challenge of Pain in Systemic Sclerosis: Similarity to the Pain Experience Reported by Sjőgren's Syndrome Patients

Rossella De Luca; Marco Maresca; Martina Orlandi; Cosimo Bruni; Kamal Solanki; Yukai Wang; Gemma Lepri; Serena Guiducci; Daniela Melchiorre; Alberto Moggi-Pignone; Wanda Rossi; Amato De Paulis; Marta Dzhus; Marco Matucci-Cerinic; Silvia Bellando-Randone

doi:10.2478/rir-2021-0015

The Emerging Challenge of Pain in Systemic Sclerosis: Similarity to the Pain Experience Reported by Sjőgren's Syndrome Patients

Rheumatol Immunol Res. 2021 Sep 28;2(2):113-119. doi: 10.2478/rir-2021-0015. eCollection 2021 Jun.

Authors

Rossella De Luca¹, Marco Maresca¹, Martina Orlandi¹, Cosimo Bruni¹, Kamal Solanki^{1

2}, Yukai Wang^{1

3}, Gemma Lepri¹, Serena Guiducci¹, Daniela Melchiorre¹, Alberto Moggi-Pignone¹, Wanda Rossi⁴, Amato De Paulis⁴, Marta Dzhus^{1

5}, Marco Matucci-Cerinic^{1

6}, Silvia Bellando-Randone¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Experimental and Clinical Medicine, University of Florence, & Division of Rheumatology AOUC, Florence, Italy.
² Department of Rheumatology, Waikato Hospital, Hamilton, New Zealand.
³ Department of Rheumatology and Immunology, Shantou Central Hospital, Shantou, Guangdong Province, China.
⁴ Department of Translational Medical Sciences, University Federico II, Naples, Italy.
⁵ Department of Internal Medicine, O. Bogomolets National Medical University, Kyiv, Ukraine.
⁶ Unit of Immunology, Rheumatology, Allergy and Rare Diseases (UnIRAR), IRCCS San Raffaele Hospital, Milan, Italy.

Abstract

In order to evaluate the importance of pain in systemic sclerosis (SSc), the characteristics of pain reported by patients with SSc were analyzed and compared with the characteristics of pain reported by patients with primary Sjőgren's syndrome (pSS). Pain was reported by 56 patients (80%) in a group of 70 patients with SSc and by 25 patients (78%) in a group of 32 patients with pSS. Pain severity was assessed by the Pain Rating Index (PRI) and the Present Pain Intensity (PPI) of the McGill Pain Questionnaire (MPQ) and by values obtained by a visual analog scale (VAS) indicating the intensity of pain felt in the moment of the examination and the intensity of pain felt in the week preceding the moment of the examination. No significant difference was detected in the comparison of mean values of pain indices between patients with SSc and patients with pSS and in the comparison among subgroups of patients with SSc. The data indicate that pain is a frequent and important cause of suffering in SSc as in other chronic diseases. The association of different methods may be especially useful to obtain a careful evaluation of pain in clinical research.

Keywords: digital ulcers; joint pain; pain assessment; primary Sjőgren’s syndrome; systemic sclerosis.