A Portable Wireless Solution for Back Pain Telemonitoring: A 3D-Based, Virtual Reality Approach - Computational Intelligence in Healthcare: Advanced Methodologies - page 415

Fig. 2. A sample patient history questionnaire
( how much a person suffers including pain description ) , and pain-related interference
with daily living activities ( indicating pain activation and symptoms ), as well as pain
location exist. However, providing an exhaustive list and description of all available
tools is beyond the scope of this work, therefore, only the tools that are relevant and
have proven their validity, as identified in the literature, will be presented.
A) Pain Intensity Assessment Tools
Traditionally, three tools have been used to measure pain intensity, namely Visual
Analogue Scales (VAS)/ Graphic Rating Scale (GRS) , Verbal Rating Scales (VRS) ,
and Numerical Rating Scales (NRS) .
a. Visual Analogues Scales (VAS)/ Graphic Rating Scales (GRS) . According to
[25], the VAS (fig. 3) is one of the most common pain measurement tools,
which has also been used in psychology as well. It typically consists of a 10-
cm straight horizontal line with endpoints that define the limits such as “no
pain” or “pain as bad as it could be”.
Fig. 3. A sample Visual Analog Scale