Hematology and oncology fellows' attitude and knowledge in cancer pain management.

2015 ◽  
Vol 33 (29_suppl) ◽  
pp. 178-178
Author(s):  
Fade A. Mahmoud ◽  
Konstantinos Arnaoutakis ◽  
Pooja Motwani ◽  
Liudmila N. Schafer ◽  
Paulette Mehta ◽  
...  

178 Background: The American Society of Clinical Oncology considers palliative care an integral part of cancer therapy. Our Hematology and Oncology fellowship at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) began a year-long palliative care curriculum to improve symptom management education. In this pilot study we evaluate fellows’ attitude and knowledge in cancer pain management before and after implementing a pain management curriculum. Methods: Hematology and Oncology Fellows were divided into three groups. Each group delivered a one hour lecture in pain management for a total of 3 didactic lectures. We adopted “Evidence based Practice of Palliative Medicine by Goldstein and Morrison” as the main textbook. Fellows answered a 30 item questionnaire to address attitudes and knowledge in pain management. Answers were scored using a 5 point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree and 5 = strongly agree). Results: 11 fellows participated; six males, five females, median age 34 (R 28-40), one US graduate, and ten foreign graduates. More fellows felt comfortable managing acute (M = 4.3, SD = 0.48) compared to chronic (M = 3.8, SD 0.78) cancer related pain. Most believe that if they were taught the principle of pain management they would feel more comfortable managing pain (M = 4.6, SD = 0.51). Post pain management module, there was a statistically significant improvement in fellow’s knowledge in pain management in the setting of renal failure (P = 0.02) and bone pain (P = 0.006), and a trend towards statistically significant in both opioid rotation and conversion (P = 0.06). Fellows did poorly on opioid-drugs interaction and management of neuropathic pain. Fellows valued palliative medicine service as a great resource for their patients but most believe that they should not refer all their patients to palliative medicine for pain management. Conclusions: Pain management skills are eroding among Oncology fellows and efforts should be made to enhance symptom and pain management education in oncology training programs. This curriculum improved knowledge and self-efficacy in pain management and revealed areas for further improvement. More research is needed to address whether fellows use and apply pain management skills in the clinical setting.

2018 ◽  
Vol 36 (34_suppl) ◽  
pp. 201-201
Author(s):  
Ali Haider ◽  
Yu Qian ◽  
Zhanni Lu ◽  
Syed Mussadiq Ali Akbar Naqvi ◽  
Amy Zhuang ◽  
...  

201 Background: Recent parenteral opioid shortage (POS) has the potential to impact cancer pain management in hospitalized patients. This study aims to compare changes in the opioid prescriptions by the inpatient palliative care (PC) team before and after the institution first reported the POS. Methods: We reviewed and compared the electronic health records of 386 consecutive eligible consultations seen by the inpatient PC team equally in one month before and after the announcement of POS on February 8, 2018. The eligibility criteria include (1) cancer diagnosis, (2) ≥18 years of age, (3) taking opioid medication at the time of consultation, and (4) having at least two consecutive visits with the PC team. Patient demographics, cancer type, opioid type, route, and dose defined as the morphine equivalent daily dose were assessed. Results: POS was associated with less use of parenteral opioids (patient controlled analgesia, and intravenous breakthrough) and more use of non-parenteral opioids (extended release, transdermal, and oral breakthrough) by the referring oncology teams, and PC team (P≤.001) (Table 1). At first PC follow-up, significantly less proportion of patients achieved better pain control after POS [119/193 (62%) versus 144/193 (75%) (P=.006)] However, at second PC follow-up, the proportion of pain improvement was similar in both cohorts. Conclusions: There is a significant change in opioid routes associated with POS. POS was associated with worse analgesia. More research is needed to better understand the impact of POS on cancer pain management.[Table: see text]


Author(s):  
Christopher Eccleston ◽  
Bart Morlion ◽  
Christopher Wells

There are over 740 million people living in the 37 countries who are members of the European Pain Federation of chapters of the International Association for the Study of Pain. The editors introduce the field of pain management, in particular the work of over 20,000 people in acute (largely injury related) pain, chronic pain including cancer pain management, and palliative care. We then describe how the book European Pain Management is structured. There are three sections: an introduction to the world of pain and the epidemiology of pain. The main section, which is 37 chapters long, reports describing the practice of pain management in each country, the challenges and innovations. And a final section looks at specific issues that cut across all nations, and ends with a concluding analysis of the statue of European Pain Management.


2019 ◽  
pp. bmjspcare-2019-001871
Author(s):  
Sarah Barry Lincoln ◽  
Enrique Soto-Perez-de-Celis ◽  
Yanin Chavarri-Guerra ◽  
Alfredo Covarrubias-Gomez ◽  
Mariana Navarro ◽  
...  

BackgroundPain control is an essential component of high-quality palliative care. Unfortunately, many low-income and middle-income countries lack an appropriate infrastructure to provide palliative care and suffer from a severe lack of access to opioid analgesics to alleviate pain from various conditions such as cancer.ObjectivesWe aimed to review the history and current status of cancer pain management in Mexico, a middle-income Latin American country. Our objective was to identify existing barriers to proper, effective opioid use, as well as provide practical recommendations for improvement.MethodsUsing a search of EBSCOhost database, PubMed and Google, we found official documents and peer-reviewed articles related to health legislation, opioid consumption, palliative care infrastructure and palliative care training in Mexico.ResultsDespite advances in palliative care and access to opioids in Mexico, there are still several barriers that undermine effective pain management, showing a major gap between policy and practice. Although Mexican legislation and guidelines include adequate palliative care and pain control as a right for all patients with cancer, the lack of adequate infrastructure and trained personnel severely hampers the implementation of these policies. Additionally, there are important barriers to prescribing opioids, many of which are related to attempts at reducing the consumption of recreational drugs.ConclusionsAlthough Mexico has made significant improvements in pain control and palliative care, much needs to be done. Expansion of drug availability, improvement of palliative care training, and constant oversight of regulations and guidelines will help to strengthen Mexico’s palliative care services.


Author(s):  
Elena Bandieri ◽  
Leonardo Potenza ◽  
Fabio Efficace ◽  
Eduardo Bruera ◽  
Mario Luppi

The increased recognition of the high prevalence and important burden of cancer pain and the documentation of a large proportion of patients receiving inadequate analgesic treatment should have reinforced the need for evidence-based recommendations. The World health Organization (WHO) guidelines on cancer pain management—or palliative care—are traditionally based on a sequential, three-step, analgesic ladder according to pain intensity: nonopioids (paracetamol or nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs) to mild pain in step I; weak opioids (eg, codeine or tramadol) to mild-moderate pain in step II; and strong opioids to moderate-severe pain in step. III. Despite the widespread use of this ladder, unrelieved pain continues to be a substantial concern in one third of patients with either solid or hematologic malignancies. The sequential WHO analgesic ladder, and in particular, the usefulness of step II opioids have been questioned but there are no universally used guidelines for the treatment of pain in patients with advanced cancer and not all guideline recommendations are evidence-based. The American Society of Clinical Oncology and the European Society of Medical Oncology have recommended the implementation of early palliative care (EPC), which is a novel model of care, consisting of delivering dedicated palliative service concurrent with active treatment as early as possible in the cancer disease trajectory. Improvement in cancer pain management is one of the several important positive effects following EPC interventions. Independent well-designed research studies on pharmacological interventions on cancer pain, especially in the EPC setting are warranted and may contribute to spur research initiatives to investigate the poorly addressed issues of pain management in non cancer patients.


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