• Saurab Sharma, Cassie Higgins, Paul Cameron, Inosha Bimali, Tim G Hales, Michael I Bennett, Lesley Colvin, and Blair H Smith.
• Centre for Pain IMPACT, Neuroscience Research Australia, Sydney, Australia; Centre for Musculoskeletal Outcomes Research, University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand; Department of Physiotherapy, Kathmandu University School of Medical Sciences, Dhulikhel, Nepal. Electronic address: saurabsharma1@gmail.com.
• J Pain. 2022 Mar 1; 23 (3): 424-433.

AbstractNeuropathic pain research and clinical care is limited in low- and middle-income countries with high prevalence of chronic pain such as Nepal. We translated and cross-culturally adapted the Self-report version of the Leeds Assessment of Neuropathic Symptoms and Signs (S-LANSS)-a commonly used, reliable and valid instrument to screen for pain of predominantly neuropathic origin (POPNO)-into Nepali (S-LANSS-NP) and validated it using recommended guidelines. We recruited 30 patients with chronic pain in an outpatient setting for cognitive debriefing and recruited 287 individuals with chronic pain via door-to-door interviews for validation. For known-group validity, we hypothesized that the POPNO group would report significantly more pain intensity and pain interference than the chronic pain group without POPNO using a cut-off score of ≥10/24. The S-LANSS-NP was comprehensible based on the ease of understanding the questionnaire and lack of missing responses. The validation sample consisted of predominantly low-levels of literacy (81% had 5 years or less education); 23% were classified as having POPNO. Internal consistency was good (alpha = .80). Known-group validity was supported (chronic pain with POPNO reported significantly greater pain intensity than those without). The S-LANSS-NP is a comprehensible, unidimensional, internally consistent, and valid instrument to screen POPNO in individuals with chronic pain with predominantly low-levels of literacy for clinical and research use. PERSPECTIVE: This paper shows that the Nepali version of the S-LANSS is comprehensible, reliable and valid in adults with chronic pain and predominantly low-levels of literacy in rural Nepal. The study could potentially develop research and clinical care of neuropathic pain in this resource-limited setting where chronic pain is a significant problem.Copyright © 2021 United States Association for the Study of Pain, Inc. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

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