Correction: Validation of the Unesp-Botucatu composite scale to assess acute postoperative abdominal pain in sheep (USAPS)

Improving Ovine Behavioral Pain Diagnosis by Implementing Statistical Weightings Based on Logistic Regression and Random Forest Algorithms

“…This is an opportunistic study using data from our previous publication [ 35 ], approved by the Ethics Committee for the Use of Animals of the School of Veterinary Medicine and Animal Science, São Paulo State University, Botucatu campus (nº 0027/2017), and following the Animal Research standards Reporting of In Vivo Experiments [ 46 ]. The experimental procedures presented in the current study were conducted for the creation, refinement, and psychometric validation of the USAPS and are presented in the previous study [ 35 ]. The present study includes unpublished analyses from the same database.…”

“…In summary, the database totaled 1536 observations from 48 sheep, evaluated at four perioperative time points, by four evaluators, and assessed twice. The data are available in the supplementary material of the previous publication [ 35 ].…”

“…In this method, the various behaviors separated into categories are noted with descriptive items rather than frequency and duration [ 33 , 34 ]. In this sense, an instrument was recently created by our team to perform a quick (4 min) and simple pain assessment in sheep—the Unesp-Botucatu composite scale to assess acute postoperative abdominal pain in sheep (USAPS) [ 35 ]. The USAPS underwent a rigorous process of psychometric refinement and validation to analyze the suitability of the instrument’s behavioral items for the purpose, followed by several statistical steps [ 36 , 37 ].…”

“…After the process, the USAPS contained only the most robust set of behavioral items for pain assessment and proved to be repeatable (intra-rater reliability) and reproducible by four evaluators (inter-rater reliability), sensitive and specific for pain diagnosis, responsive in perioperative assessments of laparoscopy, with the excellent internal consistency of behavioral items, good accuracy, and discriminatory ability to distinguish sheep suffering pain from pain-free sheep. To our knowledge, to date, the USAPS is the only scale composed of general behaviors, including broad body language, for pain assessment in sheep, that is robustly validated, practical, and simple to apply [ 35 ].…”

“…On the other hand, the segregation of behaviors into maintenance and specific pain or discomfort signals an intrinsic difference in their classification that requires consideration. Additionally, the behavioral items related to locomotion, activity, and interaction in the USAPS showed greater variation in the perioperative period than those related to appetite, posture, and head position through the descriptive statistics of the analysis of occurrences [ 35 ], suggesting different importance for each of the behaviors, regardless of their maintenance, specific pain, or discomfort classification.…”