Ecological Momentary Assessment for chronic pain in fibromyalgia using a smartphone: A randomized crossover study

Abstract

Background: Daily diaries are a useful way of measuring fluctuations in pain-related symptoms. Although this approach entails a repeated assessment, traditional diaries do not assure the gathering of data in real-time, and therefore do not solve the problem of retrospective assessment. Ecological momentary assessment (EMA) and, more concretely, real-time data capture (RTDC) by means of electronic diaries can help to improve repeated assessment in chronic pain. Method: The present work contributes to this line of research by comparing the accuracy and acceptability of an RTDC method running on a smartphone using a crossover design for a sample with a low level of education and low familiarity with technology. Forty-seven women diagnosed with fibromyalgia were randomly assigned to one of two conditions: 1) paper diary – smartphone diary, and 2) smartphone diary – paper diary, using each assessment method for one week. Results: The findings of this study showed that the smartphone diary made it possible to gather more accurate and complete ratings of relevant variables. Besides, this method was well accepted by a sample of fibromyalgia patients referred by a public hospital with a large proportion of participants with low level of education and low familiarity with technology. Conclusion: The findings of this study support the use of smartphones for ecological momentary assessment in the field of chronic pain. These methods could help clinicians and researchers to gather more accurate ratings of relevant pain-related variables even in populations with low educational levels and low familiarity with technology.