Chronic pain has been found to be associated with
various psychiatric disorders including mood, anxiety,
somatoform, and personality disorders [29] and the association
between chronic pain and depression has received
the most research and theoretical attention. Given
the prevalence of depression was higher in the chronic
pain group compared to the prevalence of anxiety disorders
[29] this emphasis is understandable.
On the other hand, there was not shown to be a consistent
pattern of association between anxiety disorders
and chronic pain [29]. However, McWilliams et al. [16]
reported that the association between chronic pain and
anxiety disorders, such as panic disorder or post-traumatic
stress disorder, was stronger than the association
between chronic pain and depression. Therefore, chronic
pain should be paid further attention in anxiety.
As already described, we confirmed 61.0% of patients
with chronic MPS revealed mild to moderate anxiety in
MPS irrelevant to depression. Also, anxiety level correlated
with pain severity at baseline (r=0.525, p