UNIVERSAL PAIN

ASSESSMENT TOOL

PREPARED BY
ROLAN J. BULANDOS JR.
 Effective pain assessments are crucial for
patient care. Not only does controlled pain
improve the patient’s comfort, it also improves
other areas of their health, including their
psychological and physical function. This is why it
is important for all health professionals to be able
to complete an accurate pain assessment and
implement successful pain management strategies.
One particular initiative that was
implemented to improve the pain management
skills of nurses was the practice of performing a
pain assessment when completing vital signs.
Although this practice allows pain intensity to be
monitored regularly, it may not necessarily
improve the quality of the pain management
delivered.
 Health professionals, especially nurses,
need to understand that pain management involves
more than just knowing the patient’s pain
intensity; it’s about how we collect more
information and what we do with it.
Pain is a subjective experience and
very individualised to the person experiencing it.
There are many different types of pain, including
neuropathic pain, somatic pain and visceral pain,
which can then also be either acute or chronic
depending on its duration. Pain assessment tools
need to be chosen to reflect the type of pain the
individual is experiencing. These assessment tools
can use either a unidimensional or multi-
dimensional approach.
 Unidimensional tools are the most commonly used
pain assessment tools and look at one area of pain, usually
pain intensity. These tools include the visual analogue scales,
verbal rating scales and verbal descriptor scales. These are
generally used when performing a pain assessment on a
patient with acute pain. We can also then evaluate any
interventions by comparing the pain intensity scores of the
individual at different times.
Multi-dimensional tools are more descriptive and
provide more information about the pain then unidimensional
tools. These tools include the McGill pain questionnaire and
brief pain inventory, and are good to use in cases of
neuropathic and chronic pain. In addition to pain intensity,
they also describe other impacts the pain has on the
individual’s physical, psychological, emotional and social
health.
 The Universal Pain Assessment Tool (UPAT)
was used to assess the level of pain in people with
limited communication skills. The UPAT enables
clinicians to consult a specialized pain management
team more often and lead to earlier interventions.
The purpose of this study was to determine,
whether the UPAT could be used as an extra tool
to collect data on functional TMJ pain and to
assess orofacial pain levels related to
temporomandibular disorder(s) (TMD) in people
with intellectual disabilities (ID).
THANK YOU