Pain practice : the official journal of World Institute of Pain
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For adequate pain treatment in patients with cancer, it is important to monitor and evaluate pain regularly. Although the numeric rating scale (NRS) is implemented in hospitals in the Netherlands, pain is still not systematically registered during outpatient consultations. The aim of this study was to assess whether home telemonitoring increases pain registration in medical records of outpatients with cancer. ⋯ Home telemonitoring for patients with cancer significantly increases registration of pain and prescriptions of analgesics in outpatient medical records. Home telemonitoring helps to increase the awareness of pain and its management.
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Chronic pain (CP) is a major public health problem affecting patients' lives and reducing physical activity. The aim is to establish subgroups of people with chronic pain (PCP) according to limitations in activities of daily living (ADLs), and to identify sociodemographic, pain-related, and psychosocial variables associated with each subgroup. ⋯ The identification of the characteristics of people with higher limitations could help guide future prevention and treatment initiatives to minimize the disabling impact of chronic pain on patients' family, work, and social life.
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Recent studies support the opinion that central sensitization (CS) plays an important role in the pathophysiology of many chronic pain conditions. CS refers to hyperexcitability of the central nervous system, which can result in pain hypersensitivity and other somatosensory symptoms. Recognition of CS-related symptomology is crucial in chronic pain evaluation and rehabilitation. The Central Sensitization Inventory (CSI) was created to evaluate symptoms that have been found to be associated with CS. The aim of the current study was the cross-cultural adaptation of the CSI into Greek (CSI-Gr). ⋯ As determined in the present study, the CSI-Gr was found to be a reliable and valid tool for recognition of CS-related symptomology.
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Intrathecal (IT) opioid pumps are one therapeutic cornerstone of refractory nonmalignant pain syndromes. The aim of this study was to evaluate the efficacy of and surgical and pharmacological complications of IT pumps beyond a time span of 10 years. ⋯ Even after a time span of over 15 years and several exchanges of pump systems, pain intensity was still reduced. After 3 years, IT drug dose remained unchanged with low side-effect and complication rates.