Outcome research in patients with chronic low back pain.

Outcome research in chronic low-back pain is entering a new phase. In the past several years, several outcome measures have been evaluated for their psychometric properties, and databases for patients with low-back pain exist for some of them. A set of recommended and standardized outcome measures and questionnaires is now available for the different outcome domains. The use of computerized versions of these questionnaires will allow simplified data collection and analyses, which will not only help to formulate a more uniform design of research trials, but can be useful for clinicians interested in documenting multi-dimensional outcomes in their patient population.