Articles: treatment.
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Intravenous administration of local anaesthetics has repeatedly been recommended for the treatment of chronic pain. Some authors have also reported on their use in postoperative pain management. However, most of these publications are case reports or refer to rather old studies or investigations based on study designs that fail to meet present scientific standards. ⋯ During the first 24 h after surgery 12 patients in the lidocaine group required a total of 550 mg meperidine in addition, while 8 patients in the control group required a total of 300 mg meperidine. The postoperative meperidine consumption was not significantly diffent between the lidocaine group and the control group. Intravenous lidocaine infusion did not significantly reduce postoperative pain after tonsillectomy in the dosage used.
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In the pain treatment of patients with incurable head and neck tumors it may be difficult to provide adequate oral drug therapy in the advanced stages. In these cases continuous subcutaneous application of morphine by means of external infusors is an alternative. An example of the method of continuous subcutaneous application of analgesics in pain therapy is shown in a patient suffering from a chondrosarcoma of the maxilla. ⋯ Because of growing tumor infiltration, we progressively increased the morphine dosage. Nevertheless, continous subcutaneous application of droperidol, dexamethasone and clonidine was also needed to achieve much better analgesia. The technical simplicity of this safe and effective treatment make it suitable for outpatient care in tumor clinics.
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The subject of treatment of pain in children and elderly patients has been neglected to date. This symposium deals with the problems of pain treatment in these two age groups and shows the importance of adequate therapy to improve their quality of life.
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The aim of the study was to determine the proportion of high-risk patients who received appropriate antianginal therapy in the prodromal phase prior to a myocardial infarction, as an indicator of medical care seeking behavior. To this end, 606 male infarct patients aged 29-65 years were retrospectively interviewed 17-21 days after acute myocardial infarct. ⋯ In stepwise logistic regression analysis, high blood pressure, older age and exhaustion were found to be associated with medical treatment before infarction in the patient group with first myocardial infarction. In patients with recurrent infarction, continued smoking and denial of the risk remained predictive of nonmedication.