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Recommended: PAIN CONCEPT
Pain management is recognized as an essential aspect of patient care by The Joint Commission and the World Health Organization along with other national professional organizations and health agencies.
The International Association for the Study of Pain (IASP) has the best known and accepted pain definition: Pain is an unpleasant sensory and emotional/affective and cognitive experience that is associated with actual or potential tissue damage or is described in terms of such damage [1]. Pain is always a personal, subjective, unique [2], and multidimensional experience and is affected by the patient’s gender [3], age, culture, previous pain experiences, and emotional factors, such as joy, grief, fear, excitement, and the patient’s beliefs and
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When patients are admitted to the hospital, shift assessments are completed by the nurse. These assessments include a patient’s complaint of pain. The patient is asked to rate their pain on a scale of 0-10 (0 = no pain and 10 = extreme pain). If the patient has a pain scale of 3-5, the nurse is to offer a PRN PO medication and then follow up within an hour to reassess the patient’s perception of the pain. If the patient has a pain scale of 6-10, the nurse is to offer IV PRN pain medications, and again to reassess pain within the hour (pain reassessments often get missed). Nurses then administer the medication as ordered, record the time administered and write the next time due on the dry erase board in the patient’s room. A standard IV PRN order for patients admitted to the hospital is Morphine 2-4 mg IVP q 4hrs. PRN pain, or Dilaudid 0.5-1 mg IVP q 4hrs PRN pain. The standard practice is to start with the lowest dose which may be repeated in 30 minutes if the patient continues to have a pain scale of 6-10. If the max. dose is reached, nurses are to report this to the doctor. The doctor will either increase the dose or increase the frequency, occasionally they will do both. With …show more content…
Use of the PCA pump is commonly seen in post-operative patients and patients in later stages of cancer. Patients have been found to prefer PCA because it allows them to self-administer their analgesia (Chumbley 2010). However, there are not very many articles written about patients admitted with abdominal pain, cellulitis or chronic pain issues such as chronic back pain, which seems to be of the most common complaints from inpatients. In the article, Efficacy of Patient-controlled Analgesia for Patients with Acute Abdominal Pain in the Emergency Department: A Randomized Trial, assesses the efficacy of PCAs for patients with acute abdominal pain verses patients dosed by a physician and then administered per the nurse. The study does not find any significant difference in pain relief or patient satisfaction, however it does state that the study does provide support for the use in the Emergency Department and there are need for further
Ferrell, B., Levy, M. H., & Paice, J. (2008). Managing pain from advanced cancer in the
Each person will respond differently to the pain experience. Therefore, the individual’s attitudes, personal experiences and knowledge are also antecedents to the concept of pain. For instance, a person that has been exposed to severe pain knows the
Pain is something that several Americans suffer from on a daily basis for varying reasons.
Lucy’s biological, psychological and social factors must all be individually addressed in order to manage her condition effectively and personally. By getting involved in a pain management programme with support and guidance from her primary physician and other multi-disciplinary team members, Lucy can be signposted towards other strategies that may complement the ones she is already using to manage her chronic pain. This proactive management would enable Lucy to learn to manage her own long term condition but with support, guidance and direction from her team of health care professionals, allowing her to take an active role in her pain management.
Winfield, H., Katsikitis, M., Hart, L. and Rounsefell, B. (1989). Postoperative pain experiences: Relevant patient and staff attitudes. [online] 34(5): pp.543-552. Available at: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6T8V-45WYV7R-7G&_user=10&_coverDate=12%2F31%2F1990&_rdoc=1&_fmt=high&_orig=gateway&_origin=gateway&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=35e6b5e8c8f803b487b35d4ae3b06cef&searchtype=a[ [accessed 8/5/2013]
Assessing and managing pain is an inevitable part of nursing and the care of patients. Incomplete relief of pain remains prevalent despite years of research due to barriers such as lack of kn...
on Pain Care will evaluate the adequacy of pain assessment, treatment, and management; identify and
The student states to the nurse educator, “Outcomes for this patient will be pain control as evidenced by report of pain relief, blood pressure decrease, and comfort and positioning techniques that will alleviate pain.”
...tive pain management and Improvement in patients outcomes and satisfaction [Magazine]. Critical Care Nurse, 35(3), 37,35,42. Retrieved from
2015). To increase the pain management for patients, solutions were raised on how to do so by providing nurses and other health professionals with more education around assessments and interventions that are appropriate, also the care for the patient needs to be more patient-centred and less generalised, and lastly an update or change in current protocols and policies regarding pain
Findings. Pain has many different meanings to many people. What is important to know as a nurse or health care provider is that pain is what the patient says it is. It is not the nurse or provider’s place to determine what the patient’s pain is but rather take an in-depth history and assessment. Using this assessment and history can therefore help treat your patient’s pain accordingly. Also pain theories have been proposed and used the implications of nursing practice in regard to pain.
Effective treatment of cancer pain is essential for ensuring the best outcomes for cancer patients, in terms of physical, psychological and social aspects. Although there are no NICE guidelines for management of cancer pain, WHO guidance should be used to inform clinical practice. Careful assessment is a critical element of the process to ensure that patients are offered the treatment which is likely to offer the best outcomes, yet without providing a greater than necessary risk of complications such as tolerance and addiction to opioids. The main outcome that this paper highlights is that “Pain is what the patient says it is and exists when he says it does” (McCaffery 1983
It will come to pass in every nurse’s career that she will be caring for a person that for whatever reason cannot communicate verbally. The reason can be vast such as dementia or language barriers. One of the biggest challenges this creates is assessing the patient’s pain level. In 2001 a system was developed by a group of critical care nurses that has been widely accepted in many healthcare systems in the US and Canada. The Adult Nonverbal Pain Scale is an assessment tool that uses five specific categories in pain assessment. However, the accuracy of this system is a matter of debate between healthcare providers and patient representatives. In this paper I will examine and compare the various methods of pain assessment used by healthcare personnel today.
The author Abdalrahim et al. (2010) stated that nurses are not being properly educated in pain and pain management; in an effort to better form an opinion on this theory, it is imperative that we have an accurate and consistent definition of pain. According to Engebretson, Monsivais, & Mahoney (2006), “Pain results from somatosensory, cognitive and emotional events, and, in the case of chronic pain, neuroplastic changes that alter the physiology and change nervous system responses to various stimuli”. There are two distinct types of pain, acute and chronic. Ferrell (2005) suggest that acute pain can be manifested by different types of trauma (sprained ankle, broken leg, stubbed toe, pulled muscle, etc.), surgical incisions or body parts manipulated during surgery, and even the effects of a cold. Chronic pain can be portrayed as many medical conditions, some examples are: migraine headaches, arthritis, clinical depression, fibromyalgia, and spinal stenosis (Ferrell, 2005). The best definition of pain for nurses to adhere to was stated by Margo McCaffrey (1968), “Pain is whatever the experiencing person says it is, existing whenever the experiencing person says it does”.
...amount of pain) is a great teaching tool for the patient who is able to self-report (Nevius & D’Arcy, 2008). This will put the patient and nurse on the same level of understanding regarding the patient’s pain. The patient should also be aware of the added information included with the pain scale: quality, duration, and location of the pain. During patient teaching, it should be noted that obtaining a zero out of ten on the pain scale is not always attainable after a painful procedure. A realistic pain management goal can be set by the patient for his pain level each day.