Imbalances in the Content of Sleep and Pain Assessments in Patients with Chronic Pain: A Scoping Review

Sleep disturbances frequently occur in concomitance with chronic pain, exacerbating its detrimental effects and diminishing patients' quality of life. Although various studies have explored the relationship between chronic pain and sleep disturbances, comprehensive evidence on detailed assessment methods and their bidirectional interactions remains limited. This scoping review aimed to examine the characteristics and prevalence of assessment methods for sleep and pain-related outcomes in individuals with chronic pain.

A comprehensive search of nine databases identified observational and interventional studies examining the relationship between sleep disturbances/disorders and chronic pain in adults. A literature search was conducted in MEDLINE, the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, Embase, PsycINFO, Web of Science, Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL) as well as gray literature sources, Open Grey. In addition, the following trial registries were searched for ongoing or unpublished trials: the World Health Organization International Clinical Trials Registry Platform and ClinicalTrials.gov.

This review included 81 of 3,513 studies. Approximately 90.1% of studies relied on self-report sleep assessments, whereas only 9.9% incorporated objective measures. Additionally, 7.4% of studies used a combination of self-report and objective sleep assessments. The visual analog and numeric rating scales were the most frequently used methods for assessing pain-related outcomes (59.3%). Despite extensive research on sleep and chronic pain, critical gaps persist, particularly in the integration of multidimensional assessment tools.

This scoping review discovered imbalances in the content of both sleep and pain assessments. Future studies should integrate both objective and self-report assessment tools to provide a more comprehensive understanding of this interaction.