Psychological factors in chronic pelvic pain due to endometriosis: a comparative study

This study compared women suffering chronic pelvic pain (CPP) secondary to endometriosis (n = 30) with women experiencing CPP due to either myofascial abdominal/pelvic pain (n = 70) or pelvic adhesions (n = 38) to determine if there are specific psychological variables uniquely associated with endometriosis.

This is a cross-sectional study of 138 women drawn from a convenience sample of 192 consecutive women with CPP presenting for evaluation to a university hospital chronic pain clinic. Subjects were categorized into groups based on their CPP diagnosis. Each subject completed a battery of validated inventories assessing demographic status, pain experience and other pain-related symptoms, pain disability, frequency of depressive symptoms, level of affective distress, satisfaction with pain treatment and satisfaction with their marital relationship.

No differences were obtained across the three groups for any of the outcome measures. Effect size computation supported the absence of clinical differences across the groups for these measures.

These findings fail to support the presence of a unique psychological profile or disproportionate psychological disturbance for women with CPP due to endometriosis. These data illustrate the importance of considering control groups that include chronic pain when exploring psychological contributions to specific chronic pain conditions.