The assessment of pain: an audit of physiotherapy practice

This study concerned the adoption of scientific method by the physiotherapy profession, with pain measurement as the research focus. It involved an audit of 1010 patient records from four hospital physiotherapy departments in England, to determine how pain was assessed and recorded. The results show that while pain assessment was recorded in most of the cases audited, there was no record of reassessment in 29 per cent of cases. In the initial assessment only 21 per cent of cases involved quantified methods, reducing to less than 2 per cent during reassessment. These results indicate that the use of recognised quantified methods for pain assessment was not standard practice amongst the physiotherapists audited. Implications for the adoption of scientific method are discussed.