A new instrument was designed to provide a practical clinical measure for assessing children's pain intensity and pain affect. The pocket size measure includes a Coloured Analogue Scale (CAS) to assess intensity and a facial affective scale to assess the aversive component of pain. Both scales have numerical ratings on the back, so that the person administering it can quickly note the numbers that represent a child's pain. This study was conducted to determine the validity of the new instrument by evaluating the psychophysical properties of the intensity scale and by evaluating the discriminant validity of the intensity and affective scales. Since visual analogue scales (VAS) are valid and reliable measures for assessing children's pain, children's ability to use the new analog scale was compared with their performance on a VAS. Children's ability to rate pain affect using an affective scale, in which the 9 faces on a Facial Affective Scale (FAS) are presented in an ordered sequence from least to most distressed, was compared to their performance on the original FAS, in which the same faces were presented in a random order. Using a parallel groups design, 104 children (5-16 years; 60 female, 44 male; 51 healthy and 53 with recurrent headaches) were randomized into two groups: CAS or VAS. Children used the assigned scale to complete a calibration task, in which they rated the sizes of 7 circles varying in area (491, 804, 1385, 2923, 3848, 5675 and 7854 mm2). The psychophysical function relating perceived circle size to actual physical size was determined for the CAS and VAS. Children's CAS and VAS responses on the calibration task yielded similar mathematical relationships: psi cas = 0.035I0.87, psi vas = 0.027I0.89, where psi = perceived magnitude and I = stimulus intensity. The R2 values were 0.921 and 0.922 for the CAS and VAS groups, respectively. Analyses of covariance revealed no significant differences in the characteristics of these relationships, i.e., R2, slope, or y intercept, by scale type. Children used the same scale to complete the Children's Pain Inventory (CPI), in which they rated the intensity and affect of 16 painful events (varying in nature and extent of tissue damage). Children's CAS and VAS responses on the CPI were similar. Analyses of covariance indicated that there were no differences in either intensity or affective ratings by scale type. However, the mean number of painful events experienced by children increased significantly with age (P = 0.0001). Intensity ratings decreased significantly with age (P = 0.002), but affective ratings did not vary with age. The new instrument has equivalent psychometric properties to a 165 mm VAS. However, the CAS was rated as easier to administer and score than the VAS, so it may be more practical for routine clinical use. Since the CAS has fulfilled the first two criteria for a pain measure (psychophysical properties and discriminant validity), it is ethical to proceed with the formal definitive test for construct validity, in which children from vari...

The protein human CC chemokine ligand 2 (CCL2, also known as monocyte chemoattractant protein 1 or MCP‐1) has been synthesized using a combination of solid phase peptide synthesis (SPPS) and native chemical ligation (NCL). The thioester‐peptide segment was synthesized using the sulfonamide safety‐catch linker and 9‐fluorenylmethoxycarbonyl (Fmoc) SPPS, and pseudoproline dipeptides were used to facilitate the synthesis of both CCL2 fragments. After assembly of the full‐length peptide chain by NCL, a glutathione redox buffer was used to fold and oxidize the CCL2 protein. Synthetic human CCL2 binds to and activates the CCR2 receptor on THP‐1 cells, as expected. CCL2 was crystallized and the structure was determined by X‐ray diffraction at 1.9‐Å resolution. The structure of the synthetic protein is very similar to that of a previously reported structure of recombinant human CCL2, although the crystal form is different. The functional CCL2 dimer for the crystal structure reported here is formed around a crystallographic twofold axis. The dimer interface involves residues Val9‐Thr10‐Cys11, which form an intersubunit antiparallel β‐sheet. Comparison of the CCL2 dimers in different crystal forms indicates a significant flexibility of the quaternary structure. To our knowledge, this is one of the first crystal structures of a protein prepared using the sulfonamide safety‐catch linker and NCL. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Biopolymers (Pept Sci) 94: 350–359, 2010. This article was originally published online as an accepted preprint. The “Published Online” date corresponds to the preprint version. You can request a copy of the preprint by emailing the Biopolymers editorial office at biopolymers@wiley.com

Using emerging international guidelines, stringent procedures were used to develop and evaluate Canadian-French, German and UK translations/adaptions of the 50 item, parent-completed Child Health Questionnaire (CHQ-PF50). Multitrait analysis was used to evaluate the convergent and discriminant validity of the hypothesized item sets across countries relative to the results obtained for a representative sample of children in the US. Cronbach's alpha coefficient was used to estimate the internal consistency reliability for each of the health scales. Floor and ceiling effects were also examined. Seventy-nine percent of all the item-scale correlations achieved acceptable internal consistency (0.40 or higher). The tests of the item convergent and discriminant validity were successful at least 87% of the time across all scales and countries. Equal item variance was observed 90% of the time across all countries. The reliability coefficients ranged from a low of 0.43 (parental time impact, Canadian English) to a high of 0.97 (physical functioning index, Canadian French) across all scales (median 0.80). Negligible floor effects were observed across countries. Noteworthy ceiling effects were observed, as expected, for the hypothesized physical scales (mean effect 73%). Conversely, fewer ceiling effects were observed for the psychosocial scales (range 3-17% behaviour-parental emotional impact). The item-scaling results obtained in these pilot studies support the psychometric properties of the American-English CHQ-PF50 and its respective translations.