Pain Catastrophizing and Acute Post-Surgical Pain in Knee Arthroplasty Patients: The Moderating Role of Social Support

Purpose: This study aimed to investigate the correlation between preoperative pain catastrophizing and social support, and acute postsurgical pain in patients who underwent knee arthroplasty. The study also aimed to determine whether social support moderates the role of pain catastrophizing psychologically in acute post-surgical pain after knee arthroplasty. Patients and Methods: This study recruited participants to survey a tertiary hospital in Dalian, China, between November 2022 and October 2023. Participants completed pain catastrophizing scales and social support reevaluated scales one day (T1) before they were confirmed to undergo knee arthroplasty, and finished the Numeric Rating Scale at 24h (T2), 48h (T3), and 72h (T4) postoperatively. Pearson correlation analyses were used to explore the relationship between social support, pain catastrophizing, and acute post-surgical pain, hierarchical regression analysis was used to test the moderating role of social support between pain catastrophizing and acute post-surgical pain. Results: This study recruited 178 knee arthroplasty patients. The results of the t-test or one-way ANOVA indicated that there were statistically significant differences in gender, age, education, occupation, disease duration, whether the knee replacement was performed for the first time, preoperative pain scores, and operation time in patients with knee arthroplasty (P P < 0.05). The correlation analysis of social support, pain catastrophization, and acute post-surgical pain in knee arthroplasty patients showed that social support was negatively correlated with acute post-surgical pain (r=-0.584, r =-0.584, P <0.01), and pain catastrophizing was positively correlated with postoperative acute pain (r=0.601, r =0.601, P <0.01); The hierarchical regression analysis revealed that social support had a significant moderating effect on the relationship between pain catastrophizing and acute post-surgical pain (Delta R2=0.606, Delta R2 =0.606, P <0.05). Conclusion: The acute post-surgical pain of knee arthroplasty patients was affected by gender, age, education, occupation, disease duration, whether the knee arthroplasty was performed for the first time, preoperative pain scores, and operation time. Acute Postsurgical pain in patients with knee arthroplasty was affected by social support and pain catastrophizing, and social support had a moderating effect on the relationship between pain catastrophizing and acute post-surgical pain.