Adult pain and anticipatory anxiety assessment in the emergency department: An integrative literature review.

INTRODUCTION Patients presenting to the emergency departments in pain often experience co-occurring symptoms. Anticipatory anxiety in the emergency department may be currently under-recognised. Clinical tools to facilitate the assessment of co-occurring symptoms aligns with providing more patient centred care and improved outcomes and experience. AIMS This integrative review aimed to identify and examine the psychometric properties of tools currently used for pain and anticipatory anxiety assessment in adult patients presenting to the emergency department. This study also aimed to identify the current clinical practice used to assess adult pain and anticipatory anxiety. METHODS Whittemore and Knafl's methodology guided the review process, and it is reported according to relevant items from PRISMA checklist. Studies were included if they focused on tools for pain or anxiety assessment of adults in emergency departments in English language publications since 2010. Quality of studies was evaluated using the Mixed Methods Appraisal Tool (MMAT). The results were summarised through narrative synthesis. RESULTS A total of 15 studies were identified for narrative synthesis. Six tools for pain, and four tools for anticipative anxiety were found. All currently used clinical tools assess symptoms in isolation. There was limited discussion of the clinical context of identified tools within the included studies. CONCLUSION Pain and anxiety assessment are currently performed in symptom isolation with a variety of tools with varying degrees of reliability. There exists a lack of clinical tools able to assess co-occurring symptoms of pain and anticipatory anxiety in the clinical setting of the emergency department. No studies discussed clinical tool use in current practice. RELEVANCE TO CLINICAL PRACTICE The reconstruction of available pain and anxiety assessment tools into one validated and holistic tool for assessment in the ED clinical setting, would provide a contextually appropriate guide to clinical assessment and treatment. Acknowledging and measuring these symptoms may facilitate future rigorous testing of experimental studies of novel methods to reduce pain and anxiety in the ED. NO PATIENT OR PUBLIC CONTRIBUTION Patient or public contribution does not apply to this Integrative Review. CLINICAL TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER Not applicable.