Chronic pain is very common but good data are scarce about the prevalence, incidence, diagnosis, severity, treatment, utilization of health care, and the impact of chronic pain on society, health care systems and the patient. Information about the epidemiology of chronic pain can help decision and policy makers decide about health budgets and prioritization, patient segmenting and budget fencing, and therapy budgets, including behavioural therapy and drug budgets.
This report aims to provide epidemiological information about chronic pain in the Netherlands using the most representative, recent, comprehensive and valid studies.
Out of 16 619 retrieved titles and abstracts, we selected 155 studies from the Netherlands that were relevant to the project questions. From these, we selected at least three studies per question that provided the most recent, representative and valid data
