this post was submitted on 10 Nov 2025
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Science Memes

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submitted 8 months ago by fossilesque@mander.xyz to c/science_memes@mander.xyz
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[–] Nythos@sh.itjust.works 5 points 8 months ago (4 children)

I’ve never been able to properly conceptualise converting the pain I’m feeling into a 1-10 scale.

It just doesn’t make sense to me

[–] lightnsfw@reddthat.com 9 points 8 months ago

The actual descriptions would work for me. I could tell someone if it's unignorable or whatever pretty easily over a number.

[–] LastYearsIrritant@sopuli.xyz 9 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Try describing the pain using the OPQRST pneumonic.

Onset - what where you doing when it started?
Provocation - does anything make it better or worse
Quality - what type of pain is it. Stabbing, burning, etc.
Radiating - is the pain in one spot, or does it radiate out to other spots.
Severity - what's the 0-10 pain scale.
Time - How long has this been occuring

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OPQRST

As you can see, Severity is just one of the parts of the assessment.

[–] Morlark@feddit.uk 2 points 8 months ago (2 children)

The numbers are irrelevant. It's just an arbitary scale.

If you were experiencing a pain that's so mild it's basically just a feeling of discomfort, you'd be able to describe that, right? And you it you were experiencing a pain so intense that it has you literally screaming? You'd be able to describe the difference between them, right? Well there's literally a conversion chart that translates those feelings into numbers.

You don't have to conceptualise anything — it's literally printed on a paper for you when they ask you the question. As long as you can experience pain and either read a description of pain severity, or describe your pain severity to someone who can read, you can use a numerical pain scale.

[–] captainlezbian@lemmy.world 3 points 8 months ago

Well yes but you get folks who see that and can imagine worse pain so they say it's a 9 instead of a 10 or who just can't really tell what a 5 feels like

[–] munk@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago

Maybe this varies from country to country, but IME the mapping of descriptions to numbers isn't clear, which makes it hard to give a good response. At best, they'll pull out something like this.

[–] Scubus@sh.itjust.works 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

Kidney stone is a ten, getting stabbed in the arm is about a 7, broken tailbone at about an 8, stubbed toe at about a 5. Papercut at a 2. Single punch or slap at a 1. Getting branded was about a 3 for like 15 seconds then it dropped down to a 1.

Its all objective of course but thats pretty much my scale

Edit: depression induced phantom pain at an 6, maybe a 7. Kinda feels like what i would imagine a heart attack to feel like