How the weather affects the pain of citizen scientists using a smartphone app
How the weather affects the pain of citizen scientists using a smartphone app
Patients with chronic pain commonly believe their pain is related to the weather. Scientific evidence to support their beliefs is inconclusive, in part due to difficulties in getting a large dataset of patients frequently recording their pain symptoms during a variety of weather conditions. Smartphones allow the opportunity to collect data to overcome these difficulties. Our study Cloudy with a Chance of Pain analysed daily data from 2658 patients collected over a 15-month period. The analysis demonstrated significant yet modest relationships between pain and relative humidity, pressure and wind speed, with correlations remaining even when accounting for mood and physical activity. This research highlights how citizen-science experiments can collect large datasets on real-world populations to address long-standing health questions. These results will act as a starting point for a future system for patients to better manage their health through pain forecasts.
Dixon, William G.
8fcb2256-4094-4f58-9777-4248ad245166
Beukenhorst, Anna L.
1b1be652-59a9-4331-933b-37c0dc6c8db9
Yimer, Belay B.
08854bab-8fc0-40b1-90ab-9dc809ce03cd
McBeth, John
98012716-66ba-480b-9e43-ac53b51dce61
24 October 2019
Dixon, William G.
8fcb2256-4094-4f58-9777-4248ad245166
Beukenhorst, Anna L.
1b1be652-59a9-4331-933b-37c0dc6c8db9
Yimer, Belay B.
08854bab-8fc0-40b1-90ab-9dc809ce03cd
McBeth, John
98012716-66ba-480b-9e43-ac53b51dce61
Dixon, William G., Beukenhorst, Anna L. and Yimer, Belay B.
,
et al.
(2019)
How the weather affects the pain of citizen scientists using a smartphone app.
npj Digital Medicine, 2, [105].
(doi:10.1038/s41746-019-0180-3).
Abstract
Patients with chronic pain commonly believe their pain is related to the weather. Scientific evidence to support their beliefs is inconclusive, in part due to difficulties in getting a large dataset of patients frequently recording their pain symptoms during a variety of weather conditions. Smartphones allow the opportunity to collect data to overcome these difficulties. Our study Cloudy with a Chance of Pain analysed daily data from 2658 patients collected over a 15-month period. The analysis demonstrated significant yet modest relationships between pain and relative humidity, pressure and wind speed, with correlations remaining even when accounting for mood and physical activity. This research highlights how citizen-science experiments can collect large datasets on real-world populations to address long-standing health questions. These results will act as a starting point for a future system for patients to better manage their health through pain forecasts.
Text
s41746-019-0180-3
- Version of Record
More information
Accepted/In Press date: 23 September 2019
Published date: 24 October 2019
Identifiers
Local EPrints ID: 491482
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/491482
ISSN: 2398-6352
PURE UUID: bb29a79d-83a7-4620-847b-03ea7764b4e0
Catalogue record
Date deposited: 25 Jun 2024 16:31
Last modified: 26 Jun 2024 02:11
Export record
Altmetrics
Contributors
Author:
William G. Dixon
Author:
Anna L. Beukenhorst
Author:
Belay B. Yimer
Author:
John McBeth
Corporate Author: et al.
Download statistics
Downloads from ePrints over the past year. Other digital versions may also be available to download e.g. from the publisher's website.
View more statistics