• S Murata, R Sawa, N Nakatsu, T Saito, T Sugimoto, R Nakamura, S Misu, Y Ueda, and R Ono.
• Department of Community Health Sciences, Graduate School of Health Sciences, Kobe University, Hyogo, Japan.
• Eur J Pain. 2017 Nov 1; 21 (10): 1717-1722.

BackgroundWe examined the association of chronic musculoskeletal pain with executive function in community-dwelling older adults.MethodThis cross-sectional study recruited 234 community-dwelling older adults in Japan (mean age: 72.7, women: 62.8%). Chronic musculoskeletal pain was defined as having moderate or more severe pain lasting ≥ 3 months. Executive function was assessed using the Digit Symbol Substitution Test (DSST), Trail Making Test (TMT) parts A and B, Letter Verbal Fluency Test (LVFT) and Category Verbal Fluency Test (CVFT).ResultsPrevalence of chronic musculoskeletal pain was 19% (n = 44). In the univariate analysis, the DSST and CVFT scores were significantly lower in the chronic musculoskeletal pain group than in the control group (DSST: chronic musculoskeletal pain group vs. control group, 40.2 vs. 45.4, respectively, p < 0.05; CVFT: 13.7 vs. 15.6, respectively, p < 0.05), whereas the TMT parts A and B and LVFT scores were not. The multivariate linear regression models adjusted for covariates showed that the chronic musculoskeletal pain group had significantly lower DSST (adjusted β = -0.13, p < 0.05) and CVFT scores (adjusted β = -0.17, p < 0.05) than the control group.ConclusionChronic musculoskeletal pain may interfere with the elements of executive function, processing speed and semantic fluency, in community-dwelling older adults. The association of chronic musculoskeletal pain with executive function requires further investigation.SignificanceOur results suggest an association between moderate-severe chronic musculoskeletal pain and impairments of semantic fluency and processing speed in community-dwelling older adults.© 2017 European Pain Federation - EFIC®.

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