Risk and Resilience Factors Impacting Treatment Compliance and Functional Impairment among Adolescents Participating in an Outpatient Interdisciplinary Pediatric Chronic Pain Management Program

Recurrent pain is a common experience in childhood and adolescence and can result in significant disability in youth, including poor quality of life, school absences, and reduced social activities. Evidence has linked adolescent risk and resilience factors with treatment outcomes. However, less research has focused on examining risk and resilience factors that may influence or predict adolescents’ compliance to treatment within an interdisciplinary pediatric chronic pain management program. Participants included 64 adolescents (M = 15.00 ± 1.69 years); 85.9% female, 84.4% Caucasian who presented to an initial evaluation in an interdisciplinary pediatric pain management program with their caregiver. Youth completed a series of questionnaires at the initial evaluation targeting pain acceptance, self-efficacy, pain catastrophizing, parental responses, pain intensity, and functional disability. Treatment compliance was measured at 3 and 6 months post-intake. Findings indicated that higher levels of adolescent-reported self-efficacy predict decreased treatment session attendance, whereas lower levels of acceptance and parental encouragement/monitoring of symptoms predict increased treatment compliance overall. Several adolescent-reported risk factors were associated with increased functional impairment among this sample. Results highlight the unique importance of risk and resilience factors within the developmental context of adolescence, while also emphasizing the need for further investigation of other relevant influences towards treatment compliance and functional impairment.