Association of Neighborhood Characteristics and Chronic Pain in Children and Adolescents in the United States

Abstract

Objective: To determine the associations between neighborhood characteristics and chronic pain during childhood and adolescence in the United States, 2020-2021. Methods: Cross-sectional analysis of the 2020 and 2021 National Survey of Children’s Health (NSCH). NSCH grouped parents’ responses to questions about neighborhood characteristics into five categories: neighborhood support, neighborhood safety, school support, neighborhood amenities, and presence of detracting neighborhood elements. Chronic pain was defined as parents reporting their children had “frequent or chronic difficulty with repeated or chronic physical pain, including headache or other back or body pain during the past 12 months.” Multivariable Poisson regression analyses estimated associations between neighborhood characteristics and chronic pain, adjusted for sociodemographic characteristics. Results: The sample contained 55,387 children (6-17 years), weighted to represent 44 million nationally. Children had significantly increased rates of chronic pain if they lived in neighborhoods that were unsupportive, unsafe, had unsafe schools, fewer amenities, and greater numbers of detracting elements (P<0.0001). After adjusting for covariates, children had significantly increased chronic pain if they lived in neighborhoods that were not supportive (adjusted prevalence rate ratio=1.7, (95% Confidence interval: 1.5-1.9, P<0.0001), with similar patterns observed for living in neighborhoods characterized as not safe, that did not have safe schools, with fewer amenities, and/or more detracting elements. Discussion: Disadvantageous neighborhood characteristics are associated with pediatric chronic pain prevalence. Future research should investigate underlying mechanisms of this association, and guide neighborhood interventions aimed at preventing and decreasing childhood chronic pain and its associated burdens.