Searching The Best Postoperative Pain Relief
Wednesday, March 5th, 2008 Subscribe To Our Feed
Pain has typically been a matter of concern in surgery whenever it was prominent – before or after.
What is pain by definition? This word comes from the Greek word ‘poin’ which means penalty. A very close aberration of this word in Latin is – poena, which means punishment. By interpretation you would say that pain is an displeasing feeling that results from any tissue damage causing depressing sensory and emotional experience.
Postoperative Pain Relief Is Still A Very Serious Issue
Once upon a time pain was perceive to be a punishment from Gods and thence, there was little exertion to fight it as its acquisition was interpreted as penalty. However today, it is not because it has been accepted as a punishment from Gods but instead pain is still under-managed mainly because of lack of alternatives.
When you are looking for postoperative pain relief, you will find that this continues to be a great challenge in spite of the advancement of technology and the availability of first-rate remedy drugs. Efforts are being put in continuously to find out and use new methods for postoperative pain relief but the results are still far from best. So the efforts continue again.
What Is Acute Pain Service?
In the 80s,the acute pain service or APS was set up in the USA more than two decades ago, with the mission of improving on the postoperative pain relief. The intensive attention paid to postoperative pain has shown favorable results though the expenses almost trebled. The basic components of APS are as given below:
1. There would be highly qualified personnel serviceable round the clock mainly for taking care of APS
2. There would be a continuous survey of pain during rest time and during activity time and this survey analyzed and improved upon
3. There would be total standardization of all instrument, prescription guidelines and assessment charts for easy understanding
4. Encouraging and promoting active cooperation and participation between doctors and nurses
5. Helping the patient comprehend the effort of postoperative pain relief and providing education on what the treatment choices are as well as what would be the side effects it any.
6. Give chase to use optimally all the pain management tools available as well as application of the latest research findings in the field of APS
In spite of the APS code, the postoperative pain relief is still unfulfilled in many advanced hospitals where the success of the surgery is perceived as the last level of medical intervention.
As a result of the efforts to promote APS today pain has been accepted and is treated in many hospitals as the fifth vital sign (in ICU) that requires the same intensive attention as the other four vital signs. The APS code looks promising and it could be that in time, the postoperative pain would be fully controlled through such effort.
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