Limitations
panic disorders, anxiety, ’, obsessive-compulsive, pain, psychiatric, depression
DISORDERS
This study has some constraints that need to be noted. First, the sample size was limited by a “convenience sample” from a single pain unit center during the COVID-19 pandemic period. This could have affected the representativeness of the population and prevented us from detecting statistically significant differences related to gene variants or from an additional sex-differences analysis. The results presented in this paper must be taken cautiously, as it would be necessary to increase the final number of patients in the study. In this regard, some post hoc analysis may be helpful to replicate the analyses with a larger number of patients in the future. Furthermore, as patients were on concomitant medication to treat other pathologies, unmeasured factors could have contributed to the observed differences, especially in relation to drugs’ AEs. They could have independently contributed to the observed AEs and differences in pain care [It should also be noted that there is a significant pharmacological pain management and psychological disorders overlap. The patients with psychiatric diagnoses (i.e., major depression, generalized anxiety, obsessive-compulsive or panic disorders), and those who used illicit drugs or medical cannabinoids, were excluded from participating in the study. Other important factors were not controlled in this study, such as female predominance, pain duration, or variables such as body mass index (MEDD was not adjusted according to body weight), testosterone/estrogen levels, or other lifestyle influences. They could have all interfered with the occurrence of pain experience and analgesic response. In this situation, they could have independently influenced the recorded side effects and should be considered in future studies.