The Ultimate Guide to Pain Management
The Ultimate Guide to Pain Management
Blog Article
To diminish these inequities surrounding pain management, providers should attempt to remove as much individual discretion from decision making as feasible. When possible, providers should utilize resources such as: checklist, guidelines, or system protocols to avoid the influences of implicit biases on their management. Providers need also recognize access limitations faced by patients and ensure any treatment regimen or follow-up planning is readily accessible.
Benzodiazepine and opioids – a safety concern. Generally, do not initiate opioid therapy in patients routinely using benzodiazepine therapy. Both drugs are sedating and suppress breathing. Together they can cause a fatal overdose.
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Psychiatric comorbidities. Review the past medical history and assess the presence of psychiatric conditions that could affect the patient’s response to chronic pain, communications with the patient about chronic pain, or treatment.
Effective chronic pain management is focused on maximizing function and limiting disability, not just on reducing pain.
Take your sleeping pill when you can get a full night's sleep. Only take a sleeping pill when you know you can get a full night's sleep of at least 7 to 8 hours.
Older anticonvulsants such as carbamazepine and phenytoin have some efficacy for neuropathic pain, but are associated with frequent adverse effects, drug-drug interactions and potentially severe adverse reactions, such as granulocytopenia and hyponatremia.
Sleep. For all patients recommend good sleep habits. Screen for sleep disturbance. Sleep complaints occur in 67–88% of individuals with chronic pain. Sleep and pain are often linked. Sleep disturbances may decrease pain thresholds and contribute to hypersensitivity of neural nociceptive pathways.
Failing urine drug screening tests. Some jobs require a negative urine drug screen, and employment may not be compatible with opioid therapy. Patient can be harmed financially and professionally if they screen positive for an opioid, even when prescribed and monitored by a clinician.
Advantages website of buprenorphine include its effectiveness, and lack of development of tolerance to it. As a Schedule III drug, it may be written with refills for up to 6 months. Disadvantages include occasional problems with rash from transdermal patch use, and greater expense.
Fentanyl. Do not prescribe fentanyl for opioid naïve patients. Only consider prescribing fentanyl in a few unusual situations. Possible examples include: transdermal when gut mu receptors should be avoided; in head and neck cancer when oral intake is challenging; end of life care; intravenous in a patient with intrathecal “pain pump”; buccal and sublingual for episodic and breakthrough end-stage cancer pain.
Urine drug testing. Obtain a urine drug screen (UDS) for all patients on chronic opioid therapy at least once per year, and any time there is a concern for inappropriate use, use of other substances, or diversion.99
Chronic primary pain syndromes. These syndromes represent a disease itself. A chronic primary pain syndrome is defined as pain in one or more anatomical regions that persists or recurs for longer than 3 months and is associated with significant emotional distress or functional disability (interference with activities of daily life and participation in social roles) and that cannot be better accounted for by another chronic pain condition.17
Read the medication guide. Read the medication guide for patients so that you understand how and when to take your medicine and what the major potential side effects are. If you have any questions, ask your pharmacist or health care provider.