Burden of neuropathic pain on quality of life in the United States: BEAT neuropathic pain observational study

Neuropathic pain (NeP) may result from physical injury/trauma, systemic disease, infections and autoimmune disorders, and has been shown in painful diabetic neuropathy (pDPN) to be associated with reduced quality of life and functioning. This observational study sought to comprehensively characterize the humanistic burden of NeP, by pain severity. A total of 624 subjects recruited during routine physician office visits had a diagnosis of one of the following: human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-related NeP, post-trauma/post-surgical (PTPS) NeP, spinal cord injury (SCI)-related NeP, chronic low back pain (CLBP) with NeP, pDPN, and painful peripheral neuropathy with small fiber involvement (PPN-SF). Subjects completed a one-time questionnaire containing validated measures of pain severity and pain interference, health status, sleep, and anxiety and depression. Subjects’ mean age was 55.5 years; 55.4% were male. Mean number of comorbidities was 3.2. Mean scores overall were 5.5 and 5.6 for pain severity and pain interference (0-10 scale); 31.1 and 42.5 for physical and mental health status (0-100 scale); 0.55 for health utility (-0.1-1.0 scale); 50.5 for sleep problems (0-100 scale); and 8.8 and 8.2 for anxiety and depression (0-21 scale). For each patient-reported outcome, scores were significantly worse among subjects with greater pain severity (all p<0.0001). Mean scores for each NeP condition ranged from 5.2-6.0 for pain severity, 5.0-6.6 for pain interference, and 27.2-34.4 and 39.0-45.8 for physical and mental health status, respectively. For each patient-reported outcome, CLBP-NeP subjects reported the worst scores followed by PTPS subjects, except for mental health status, utility, and anxiety, where HIV-NeP or SCI-NeP subjects reported one of the two worst mean scores. Subjects across NeP conditions exhibited high pain levels, which were statistically significantly associated with poor function, compromised health status and sleep, and increased anxiety and depression, indicating substantial humanistic burden. Study supported by Pfizer, Inc.