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Nursing Essay: Pain Management.

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Introduction
This essay will aim to look at the main principles of cancer pain management on an acute medical ward in a hospital setting. My rational for choosing to look at this is to expend my knowledge of the chosen area. Within this pieces of work I will look to include physiological, psychological and sociological aspects of pain management.
Pain, which is defined in its widest sense as an emotion which is the opposite of pleasure (White, 2004, p.455), is one of the major symptoms of cancer, affecting a majority of sufferers at some point during their condition (De Conno & Caraceni, 1996, p.8). The World Health Organization (WHO, 2009, online) suggests that relief from pain may be achieved in more than 90 percent of patients; …show more content…

De Wit et al (2001) state that the cognitive dimension of cancer pain deals with what patients pain means to them and how they think of it in terms of beliefs, attitudes and thoughts. This is to do with their personality. A patient’s beliefs effect how they cope with pain. They can initiate coping strategies and their level of adjustment to pain. Sofaer (1992) notes that pain causes anxiety and in turn anxiety can heighten pain.
Guidelines for Treatment
Provision of pain relief is a shared responsibility of the interdisciplinary health care team. For example it may initially form part of the oncologist’s remit to determine the most effective pain management plan for the patient. After treatment has been initiated, oncology nurses may then adopt responsibility for ensuring that pain relief is adequate via regular assessment and action (NICE, 2004, p.80).
Aside from determining the type of pain suffered, the other major consideration in treating pain for cancer patients is to determine the level of pain. A significant proportion of patients experiencing pain would grade this as moderate to severe, but some may have only mild to moderate pain which may respond to lower risk treatment options (van den Beuken-van Everdingen et al., 2007, p.1437).
Drug therapy is described by Fitzgibbon and Loeser (2010, p.190) as the cornerstone of treating cancer pain. There is currently no specific NICE guidance on pain management on cancer. However, opioids

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