• Yuki Sumazaki Watanabe, Tomofumi Miura, Ayumi Okizaki, Keita Tagami, Yoshihisa Matsumoto, Maiko Fujimori, Tatsuya Morita, and Hiroya Kinoshita.
• Department of Palliative Medicine, National Cancer Center Hospital East, Kashiwa, Japan.
• J Pain Symptom Manage. 2018 Apr 1; 55 (4): 1159-1164.

ContextThe achievement of a personalized pain goal (PPG) is advocated as an individualized pain relief indicator.ObjectivesPain relief indicators, including PPG, pain intensity (PI), and interference with daily activities (interference), were compared herein.MethodsThis was a single-center cross-sectional study. Adult patients with cancer on opioid medications who visited the outpatient clinic at the National Cancer Center Hospital East between March and September 2015 were consecutively enrolled. Patients conducted a self-report questionnaire, including reports of average PI, interference, PPG, and the need for further analgesic treatment. We compared the proportion of patients achieving PPG (PI ≤ PPG) and other pain relief indicators including PI ≤3 or interference ≤3 and the percentage of patients who did not need further analgesic treatment among those who fulfilled each pain relief indicator.ResultsA total of 347 patients (median age 64; 38% females) were analyzed. Median (interquartile range [IQR]) of PPG, PI, and interference was 2 (IQR 1-3), 2 (IQR 1-4), and 2 (IQR 0-5), respectively. The proportion of patients achieving PPG was 45.3% and significantly lower than those with PI ≤3 (69.0%; P < 0.001) and interference ≤3 (70.2%; P < 0.001). Eighty percent of patients achieving PPG did not need further analgesic treatment, whereas 70.8% of patients with PI ≤3 (P < 0.001) and 73.3% with interference ≤3 did need further analgesic treatment (P < 0.001).ConclusionThe achievement of PPG was a stricter pain relief indicator than PI and interference and may reflect a real need for pain control.Copyright © 2017 American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

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