Yonsei Med J.  2016 Mar;57(2):449-454. 10.3349/ymj.2016.57.2.449.

Validation of the Korean Version of the DN4 Diagnostic Questionnaire for Neuropathic Pain in Patients with Lumbar or Lumbar-Radicular Pain

• Kim HJ
• Park JH
• Bouhassira D
• Shin JH
• Chang BS
• Lee CK
• Baek CH
• Yeom JS

• KMID: 2374052
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.3349/ymj.2016.57.2.449

Abstract

PURPOSE
To evaluate the diagnostic value of the Korean version of the Douleur Neuropathique 4 (DN4) questionnaire and to validate this questionnaire in terms of psychometric properties in patients with chronic pain due to degenerative spinal disease.
MATERIALS AND METHODS
The Korean version of the DN4 questionnaire, which was translated and linguistically validated by the MAPI Research Group, was tested on 83 patients with lumbar or lumbar-radicular pain. Test-retest reliability was evaluated in a subsample of 40 patients who completed two assessments with an interval of 2 weeks. Nociceptive pain and neuropathic component pain were diagnosed in 40 and 43 patients, respectively.
RESULTS
The Cronbach's alpha coefficient of internal consistency was 0.819, and the test-retest intraclass correlation coefficient (3, 1) (95% confidence interval) was 0.813 (0.776-0.847) (n=40). The area under the receiver-operator characteristics curve was 0.953 (p<0.001), with 95% confidence interval between 0.869 and 0.990. The Korean version of the DN4 questionnaire showed a sensitivity of 100% and 87.1%, and a specificity of 88.2% and 94.1% at the cutoff value of 3/10 and 4/10, respectively, for discriminating neuropathic component pain.
CONCLUSION
The present study demonstrated the good discriminatory power of DN4 between nociceptive pain and neuropathic component pain in patients with lumbar or lumbar-radicular pain.

Keyword

Neuropathic pain; Korean language; Douleur Neuropathique 4 questionnaire; psychometric validation

MeSH Terms

Adult
Aged
Aged, 80 and over
Chronic Pain/*diagnosis
Female
Humans
Male
Middle Aged
Neuralgia/*diagnosis
Pain Measurement/*methods
Psychometrics
Reproducibility of Results
Sensitivity and Specificity
Surveys and Questionnaires/*standards
Translating

Figure

• 

  Fig. 1 ROC curve and AUC for the total score of the DN4 questionnaire: the figure shows the cut-off point of optimizing sensitivity and specificity values for discriminating between nociceptive pain and neuropathic component pain in patients with degenerative spinal disease. AUC, area under the curve; ROC, receiver operating characteristics; DN4, Douleur Neuropathique 4.

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