Table of Contents

Musculoskeletal pain (WPI)

The Widespread Pain Index quantifies the extent of bodily pain. The WPI is required to identify individuals that meet the diagnostic criteria of fibromyalgia in epidemiological studies (section: Diseases & symptoms).
Note that pain was also assessed in Lifelines participants as a symptom of several specified medical conditions, for example here.

Background

Lifelines repeatedly assessed the presence of fibromyalgia by self-report. However, recent studies indicate that this method misses ~77% of fibromyalgia diagnoses1). The WPI improves the identification of participants that meet the diagnostic criteria for fibromyalgia by assessing the presence of individual symptoms rather than the disease itself.
The WPI assesses bodily pain on a 0-19 scale by asking participants if they have had pain or tenderness in 19 different body regions over the past week, with each painful or tender region scoring 1 point.
The instrument originated as a part of the Fibromyalgia Survey Questionnaire (FSQ) that sets diagnostic criteria for fibromyalgia. The full FSQ also contains a symptom severity score (SSS) for the following symptoms: fatigue, waking unrefreshed, cognitive symptoms and somatic symptoms 2). In Lifelines, this information can be derived from other variables (i.e. fatigue (general), symptoms (SCL-90), and various cognition-related variables).

Validity

A recent German study showed that the reliability, convergent and discriminant validity of the FSQ were good, however, the The WPI was not evaluated separately3).

Variables

Questions English Questions Dutch Code Variable Assessment Age
Please indicate whether the parts of the body listed below were painful and/or tender in the past 7 days: Geef aan of de onderstaande lichaamsdelen pijnlijk en/of gevoelig waren in de afgelopen 7 dagen:
Left shoulder Linker schouder wpi_shoulderleft_adu_q_01 WPI1 2A 3A NEXT 18+
Right shoulder Rechter schouder wpi_shoulderright_adu_q_02 WPI2 2A 3A NEXT 18+
Left hip Linker heup wpi_hipleft_adu_q_03 WPI3 2A 3A NEXT 18+
Right hip Rechter heup wpi_hipright_adu_q_04 WPI4 2A 3A NEXT 18+
Left upper arm Linker bovenarm wpi_upperarmleft_adu_q_05 WPI5 2A 3A NEXT 18+
Right upper arm Rechter bovenarm wpi_upperarmright_adu_q_06 WPI6 2A 3A NEXT 18+
Left lower arm Linker onderarm wpi_lowerarmleft_adu_q_07 WPI7 2A 3A NEXT 18+
Right lower arm Rechter onderarm wpi_lowerarmright_adu_q_08 WPI8 2A 3A NEXT 18+
Left upper leg Linker bovenbeen wpi_upperlegleft_adu_q_09 WPI9 2A 3A NEXT 18+
Right upper leg Rechter bovenbeen wpi_upperlegright_adu_q_10 WPI10 2A 3A NEXT 18+
Left lower leg Linker onderbeen wpi_lowerlegleft_adu_q_11 WPI11 2A 3A NEXT 18+
Right lower leg Rechter onderbeen wpi_lowerlegright_adu_q_12 WPI12 2A 3A NEXT 18+
Left side of jaw Linker kaak wpi_jawleft_adu_q_13 WPI13 2A 3A NEXT 18+
Right side of jaw Rechter kaak wpi_jawright_adu_q_14 WPI14 2A 3A NEXT 18+
Chest Borstkas wpi_chest_adu_q_15 WPI15 2A 3A NEXT 18+
Abdomen Buik wpi_abdomen_adu_q_16 WPI16 2A 3A NEXT 18+
Upper back Bovenrug wpi_upperback_adu_q_17 WPI17 2A 3A NEXT 18+
Lower back Onderrug wpi_lowerback_adu_q_18 WPI18 2A 3A NEXT 18+
Neck Nek wpi_neck_adu_q_19 WPI19 2A 3A NEXT 18+
1)
Warren JW, Clauw DJ (2012). Functional somatic syndromes: sensitivities and specificities of self-reports of physician diagnosis. Psychosomatic Medicine 74(9):891-895
2)
Wolfe F. et al. (2011) Fibromyalgia criteria and severity scales for clinical and epidemiological studies: a modification of the ACR Preliminary Diagnostic Criteria for Fibromyalgia. Journal of Rheumatology 38(6): 1113–1122
3)
Häuser W. et al. (2012). Validation of the Fibromyalgia Survey Questionnaire within a cross-sectional survey. PLoS One 7(5):e37504