The Brief Pain Inventory
The next iteration of our pain measure was the long form of the Brief Pain Inventory
(BPI; Cleeland, 1989; Cleeland, 1990; Cleeland, 1991; Cleeland & Ryan, 1994). In this
new instrument, we added the item “least pain” to the severity items and dropped the
categorical rating scale for the interference items, in response to patient preference.
The interference items were now presented with 0–10 scales, with 0=no interference
and 10=interferes completely. The initial version of the BPI used a recall period of one
week for both pain severity and pain interference ratings, included questions about
medication use, and asked the patient to check potential pain quality descriptors that
may describe their pain. The BPI long form also asked questions about the percentage
and duration of pain relief and nonmedical methods used to relieve pain. This version of the BPI proved to be too lengthy for repeated use in clinical monitoring
or as a repeated measure in research. As a result, we developed a shorter version of
the BPI. This version of the BPI retained the front and back body diagrams, the four
pain severity items and seven pain interference items rated on 0–10 scales, and the
question about percentage of pain relief by analgesics. The most important difference
between the longer and shorter versions of the BPI is that the latter uses a 24-hour
recall period.
Whereas the BPI long form is still used as a baseline measure in clinical trials,
the shorter version has become the standard for use in clinical and research
applications. The short form is typically what is referred to when the BPI is cited in
research, and it is the version we describe below. Most psychometric evaluations of the
BPI have been performed on the short form.