Algoplus® Scale in Older Patients with Dementia: A Reliable Real-World Pain Assessment Tool

Pain is still a neglected clinical issue in elderly people with dementia and/or communicative disorders, with an unacceptable higher rate of under diagnosis and under treatment. Cognitive deficit and emotional and psychological disturbances entangle pain symptoms, affecting patient self-report. So far, observational pain tools do not have fully adequate clinimetric properties and quality requirements for easy-to-use daily rating. Older patients with dementia represent a clinical challenge. The assessment of pain is important for improving clinical outcomes, such as functional status, frailty trajectories, comorbidity, and quality of life. The PAINAID scale appears to be the most accurate pain tool in people with dementia along with the Algoplus® scale, a recently developed tool to rapidly assess acute pain in hospitals settings. The present study aimed to assess the clinimetric properties of the Algoplus®, as compared to PAINAID, for detecting acute pain in a real-world cohort of hospitalized older patients with dementia.