Pain research & management : the journal of the Canadian Pain Society = journal de la société canadienne pour le traitement de la douleur
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To describe the results of an audit of patients who received epidural analgesics postoperatively and the subsequent development of a formal acute pain management service in a community hospital. ⋯ As a result of the audit, an acute pain management service was developed. This included a team that did daily rounds and consisted of a nurse clinician and an anesthesiologist who was assigned to the service on a weekly basis. A committee was created, and formalized policies and procedures were established. Standardized order sheets, data sheets and a computerized database were developed. Reports for administrative and quality improvement purposes were generated monthly. Education programs were developed. Co-analgesia and transitional analgesia are now part of routine care, and epidural catheter placement close to the site of incision is encouraged. A postoperative nausea and vomiting algorithm, and a treatment regimen for pruritus have also been implemented.
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Judgments about an individual's pain can be profoundly important to sufferers. Relatively few studies have examined variables that may affect observers' judgments of the pain of others. The present article reports two studies investigating the relationship between different kinds of exposure to pain problems and observers' ratings of the pain intensity of patients. ⋯ Together, the findings imply that one's experiences with the different problems of pain patients may affect pain judgments. Alternative interpretations of the findings are considered.