Redesigning the Pain Assessment Conversation

<p>Pain is the number one reason people access the healthcare system. Yet, it remains widely inadequately assessed, eventually leading to complications and compromises in quality of care. Self-report scales reduce the complexity to uni-dimensional statements of pain severity; for example, by asking patients to estimate their pain intensity on a 0 to 10 scale. While this is at best appropriate for acute pain, it is an oversimplification for chronic pain patients. This project investigates how patients and clinicians negotiate pain communication and proposes a novel way for patients and clinicians to assess an communicate pain, by using a set of expressive abstract animations which can be visually configured to reflect change in intensity. The project also discusses the dynamics between a patient and clinician, as well as the challenges inherent in the interactions.</p>