Young people with chronic pain are three times more likely than their peers to also have clinical anxiety or depression, a new review has found. Led by researchers at Macquarie University, the study suggests a third of children under the age of 18 who have chronic pain also meet the criteria for anxiety disorder, while one in eight meets the criteria for a depressive disorder. The results are published in the latest edition of JAMA Paediatrics and comprise a metareview of 79 studies that covered nearly 23,000 children and youths under the age of 18, including more than 12,000 with chronic pain.
It included conditions where pain is the primary symptom, such as juvenile idiopathic arthritis and fibromyalgia, chronic diseases where pain is a secondary symptom, such as Crohn's disease and colitis, and cases where the pain has no known cause. Lead author, Dr. Joanne Dudeney, is a clinical psychologist and a Macquarie University Research Fellow in the School of Psychological Sciences.
"The findings indicate we risk doing young people a disservice if we're not considering comorbid anxiety and depression when they're presenting with chronic pain," she says. "Clinically, I was seeing a lot of young people with chronic pain who were also being diagnosed with anxiety and depression, but those comorbid psychological conditions weren't showing up in the body of research on pain. "The research mostly related to fear of pain, pain anxiety and pain catastrophisation, which centres on the con.