Pain management nursing : official journal of the American Society of Pain Management Nurses
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Managing pain in those vulnerable populations who are unable to self-report or communicate is challenging due to difficulty recognizing pain presence and severity. As no valid and reliable objective measure of pain exists, the ASPMN supports assessment practice recommendations that gather relevant information to infer presence of pain and evaluate response to intervention. Nurses and other healthcare professionals must be advocates for those who are unable to speak for themselves regarding their pain experience.
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Current guidelines support family members' participation in care, but little is known regarding their potential contribution to pain assessment using validated behavioral pain scales. ⋯ Future research is needed to explore the views of more family members and to compare their Critical-Care Pain Observation Tool scores to the ones of nurses' for interrater reliability testing.
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Pain in people with dementia is a common occurrence. Providing evidence-based pain management for people with dementia in residential aged care services is imperative to providing quality care. However, it remains unclear from current research how various aged care staff (Registered Nurses (RNs), Enrolled Nurses (ENs), Personal Care Assistants (PCAs)) engage at specific points of the pain management pathway. With structural changes to the residential aged care workforce over the past two decades, understanding the relative contributions of these aged care staff to pain management practices is crucial for future practice development. ⋯ Despite the high prevalence of pain in people with dementia in aged care settings, current pain management documentation does not reflect best practice standards. Future capacity building initiatives must engage PCAs, as key stakeholders in pain management, with support and clinical leadership of nursing staff.
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Despite strong evidence that repeated pain exposure in neonates is associated with adverse outcomes, pain assessment and management continues to be less than optimal in most neonatal intensive care units (NICUs). ⋯ Increased efforts are needed to promote consistent pain assessment and management to ensure optimal outcomes for vulnerable at risk neonates.
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Pain is one of the most common symptoms experienced by patients in acute care hospitals and acutely ill patients experience both acute and chronic pain. Unrelieved pain can have a profound negative impact on individuals' functional status, well-being, quality of life, and satisfaction with care. For providers, managing pain can be challenging. While the numeric rating scale is widely accepted and used, it measures only pain intensity. CAPA® pain assessment offers an alternative approach in which providers have a conversation with patients about pain and how it impacts five key areas. ⋯ CAPA® is recommended as a supporting assessment to evaluate patients' pain experience in acute care.