Understanding pain mechanisms in children and young people with cerebral palsy: feasibility and acceptability of quantitative sensory testing.

PURPOSE: Chronic pain is common among young people with cerebral palsy (CP), yet underlying somatosensory mechanisms remain poorly understood. This study evaluated the feasibility, acceptability, and consistency of a standardised quantitative sensory testing (QST) protocol in this population.

METHODS

A multisite cross-sectional study across three Australian centres enrolled 35 young people with CP aged 8-25 years who were able to self-report. A mechanical QST battery assessed tactile and vibration detection, mechanical pain sensitivity and threshold, dynamic mechanical allodynia, wind-up ratio, and pressure pain threshold. Feasibility was defined by protocol completion rates, acceptability by stakeholder feedback and consistency by intraclass correlation coefficients.

RESULTS

Full protocol completion was achieved by 45.7% of participants, with the remainder contributing partial but usable data. Non-nociceptive measures were better tolerated than pinprick-based assessments. Within-session consistency varied across modalities, ranging from poor to excellent. Mean assessment duration was 67 min. Acceptability was rated highly by participants and guardians.

CONCLUSIONS

Mechanical QST is safe, acceptable and can be implemented flexibly across the functional diversity of young people with CP who can self-report. A pragmatic battery may support mechanism-based pain and somatosensory assessment in rehabilitation settings to enable individualised management, pending CP-specific normative data and protocol validation.