Journal of pain and symptom management
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J Pain Symptom Manage · Aug 2013
Randomized Controlled Trial Multicenter StudyAn open-label extension study to investigate the long-term safety and tolerability of THC/CBD oromucosal spray and oromucosal THC spray in patients with terminal cancer-related pain refractory to strong opioid analgesics.
Chronic pain in patients with advanced cancer poses a serious clinical challenge. The Δ9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC)/cannabidiol (CBD) oromucosal spray (U.S. Adopted Name, nabiximols; Sativex(®)) is a novel cannabinoid formulation currently undergoing investigation as an adjuvant therapy for this treatment group. ⋯ This study showed that the long-term use of THC/CBD spray was generally well tolerated, with no evidence of a loss of effect for the relief of cancer-related pain with long-term use. Furthermore, patients who kept using the study medication did not seek to increase their dose of this or other pain-relieving medication over time, suggesting that the adjuvant use of cannabinoids in cancer-related pain could provide useful benefit.
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J Pain Symptom Manage · Aug 2013
Randomized Controlled TrialDoes assessing patients' expectancies about chemotherapy side effects influence their occurrence?
Increasing evidence suggests a link between patients' expectancies and post-chemotherapy side effects. However, it remains unclear whether asking patients about their expectancies might actually increase side effects. ⋯ These findings suggest that patient expectancies might be a useful point of intervention for attempting to reduce the burden of chemotherapy-related side effects, as there do not appear to be any detrimental effects of asking patients to report their expectancies and their expectancies do appear related to the occurrence of post-treatment side effects.
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J Pain Symptom Manage · Aug 2013
The development and validation of a shorter version of the Canadian Health Care Evaluation Project Questionnaire (CANHELP Lite): a novel tool to measure patient and family satisfaction with end-of-life care.
The recently developed Canadian Health Care Evaluation Project (CANHELP) questionnaire, which can be used to assess both patient and family satisfaction with end-of-life care, takes 40-60 minutes to complete. The length of the interview may limit its uptake and clinical utility; a shorter version would make its use more feasible. ⋯ The CANHELP Lite questionnaire is a valid and internally consistent instrument to measure satisfaction with end-of-life care.
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J Pain Symptom Manage · Aug 2013
Genetic variations in interleukin-8 and interleukin-10 are associated with pain, depressed mood, and fatigue in lung cancer patients.
A report by the National Cancer Institute identified that an important gap in symptom research is the investigation of multiple symptoms of cancer that might identify common biological mechanisms among cancer-related symptoms. ⋯ The interaction of multiple inflammation genes, along with nongenetic factors, underlies the occurrence of symptoms. IL-8 and IL-10 may serve as potential targets for treating multiple symptoms of cancer.