Pain Concept Analysis

In my nursing practice I frequently care for long term elderly residents on ventilators and who suffer from stage 3 or 4 pressure ulcers, diabetic, venous ulcers etc. Instead of simply providing pain medications and wound treatment to ease their pain or giving medications to relax them, I wanted to learn ways to enhance the comfort of these residents. This led me to learn more about Katherine Kolcaba’s theory of comfort. I found her theory to be useful in understanding the theory of comfort. Hence as a nurse, it became important for me to analyze, evaluate and research more on its applicability in the world of nursing and also in other health care disciplines.

I support this idea of achieving absolute pleasure from the removal of all pain due to a series of corresponding reasons. The first factor addressed in support of this claim is the tendency of human nature to focus on the negative. This observation will lead to the second supporting idea that these distresses which culminate towards the feeling of pain often block out the feeling of the pleasure desired. This secondary notion results in a comparison between the subsequent uplifting experiences from the removal of pain as opposed to the effect of a simple everyday pleasure on the mind. I

Pain is one of the most influential symptoms that leads individuals to reach out to health care professionals to seek relief. Pain is subjective and unique to each person. Some individuals may have a higher pain tolerance than others. According to Frandsen (2014), “Pain is an unpleasant, sensory, emotional sensation associated with actual or potential tissue injury” (p. 889). Pain may be caused by a variety of elements, such as tissue or nerve damage and surgery. There are three main categories that pain is classified by, which are origin, duration, and cause. The main focus of this paper is on acute pain, chronic pain, and phantom pain. It is crucial to know how to assess each type of pain, as well as how to enhance it, or decrease the pain.

According to Kolcaba’s Comfort Theory, humans elicit holistic responses to complex stimuli (Nursing Theory Organization, 2011). Those responses require interventions by the nurse which address those responses in an equally holistic manner. The in-patient setting within the surgical orthopedic unit seems to exemplify the perfect setting in which to utilize those concepts. Minimizing pain in the post-surgical patient is the main focus of the surgical orthopedic nurse. With pain as the opposite of comfort, the focus of Kolcaba’s theory also seems to be the elimination of the patient’s painful state. In the in-patient environment, the four contexts in which comfort occurs can be easily assessed, adjusted, and manipulated as necessary. The origin of the patient’s pain is more obvious, so that the interventions utilized to minimize that pain are easily evaluated.

Uncontrolled pain can have a major impact on a patient’s quality of life and the ability to obtain successful operative outcome. (Crisp et. al 2012) The importance of pain management in postoperative care is emphasised in this essay, to provide the understanding that effective postoperative care includes providing the patients with maximum comfort, satisfaction and encourage the healing process for early discharge from hospital. Inadequate pain control in postoperative care can also enable the patient to feel hopelessness, develop depression and other effects that can lead to detrimental consequences. (Human Rights Watch 2009) Therefore, the effects of uncontrolled pain is also discussed in this essay, to highlight the significance of appropriate

I will argue that pain is avoided because it is an unpleasant condition and that chronic pain affects social relationships. An objection to this will argue that the reason for pain is self-preservation and anything that is contradictory to this is infringing on our base desires to live. I will also show how this objection fails since it gets at pain that is a sign for a deeper problem, but fails to assess chronic pain, which is my situation. This paper will focus on situations where the medication is taken for pain management, which should not to be confused with pain relief. The difference, as explained to me by a physician, is that management allows for one to continue living without constant hindrance from pain, whereas relief is to reduce pain to avoid being in

Many theories have been suggested for clinical presentation of pain such as Cartesian module of pain in the 17th century and the 19th century specificity theory of pain. The 20th century central summation, sensory interaction, gate control, and biopsychosocial theories show deferent concepts from the simpler cause and effect approaches that essential in the Cartesian model and specificity theory. Traditionally within physiotherapy and medicine the medical/disease model has been suggested. Medical/Disease model acts on the basis that all pain has a dominant tissue or structural source. This model is founded on the Cartesian model and specificity theory of pain where pain is considered as sign of tissue injury and damage (Waddell, 2004)

Pain affects all aspects of life, physical, emotional, psychological, social and spiritual. Clinicians in order to be effective need to understand these many aspects of pain management.

Pain is a protective biological mechanism experienced by all people, an indication that damage has or may have occurred to tissues and nerves which fluctuates based on the severity of damage (Raja, Hoot & Dougherty, 2011, p. 1; Lynch, Craig & Peng, 2011. p. 3). It is an unpleasant, subjective experience both emotionally and sensory that varies for every person. There are many factors that can increase the perception of pain experienced including emotional, social, spiritual and functional circumstances (Lynch, Craif & Peng, 2011, p.3). According to Dr John Keltner, pain therapist (as cited in Schleifer, 2014, p.36) there is myriad brain states relating to pain and pain is a diverse, varied experience and new aspects are constantly being discovered. Generally, two types of pathophysiological pain are recognised; nociceptive and neuropathic.

Also the findings can be a baseline for future research in getting effective health intervention that can help in developing a nursing research. Pain is now the considered as part of vital signs in most hospitals, therefore we need an effective nursing model for pain. The concept of pain is an essential part of healthcare. Most elderly feel significant pain complications secondary to arthritis (Walker el al., 1990). In order to successful cope with continuing pain felt by elderly population, their perception of pain and the managing approaches used need to be assumed (Jensen el al.,

Pain defined as an unpleasant physical suffering or sensation that is set off in the nervous system and affects a broad range of population from neonates to elderly. Pain can be either acute in nature which could last for few days to a week, sub-acute (two weeks to twelve weeks) or chronic in nature (lasts more than twelve weeks to years or even decades). In the world of rehabilitation, acute pain is seen as a warning sign and can be treated whereas chronic pain is more complex but treatable. Physical therapists often treat patients suffering from chronic pain that is physically disabling in nature. Evidence points out that pain is the universal complaint in emergency department visits and opioids, namely morphine is the norm of treatment of

Approximately 7 to 64% of all individuals will have persistent pain (Hadjistavropoulos et al., 2011). Thus there are effects to having persistent pain (Hadjistavropoulos et al., 2011). Some of those effects of having persistent pain are the following: impact on wellbeing, impact on employment and impact on social function (Hadjistavropoulos et al., 2011). Research has shown that there has been progress made with communicating and controlling pain however they are only minor steps (Hadjistavropoulos et al., 2011). Therefore with seeing that communicating pain is a significant aspect when dealing with pain researchers wanted

As simple as it sounds, pain is anything but simple. Pain is a multidimensional perceptual experience that not only includes the physical injury but consequences that are not physiologic at all. Think about the last time you hurt yourself -- not only did you feel the sensory (ouch!), but you also had a behavioral reaction (maybe you moved away from something), you had a thought (“I can’t belief I did that.”), an image or memory (the last time you did it), an emotion (anxiety, irritation), and a social experience (sympathy). Each one of these is like a river that feeds into the pool of pain. Because there are so many channels, peoples’ experience of pain is unique to them -- and those who appear to have identical injuries or illnesses can

Pain perception consists of more than mere sensation. Researcher’s interest has been held in the task of determining what components form a patient’s experience of pain. The perception to this particular stimuli has a strong psychological contribution where both affective and evaluative components hold emphasis as some of the main predictors in a given pain signal. Production and transmission of pain signals in addition, also contribute to an individual’s experience with pain (Patterson & Ptacek, 1997).

The standard view in both philosophy and the sciences treats pains as being unpleasant experiences: Pains are thought to be phenomenal mental states with a particular type of phenomenal character—ie., pains hurt. The standard view of pain has a number of implications, including that it rules out the existence of unfelt pains (an unfelt pain would both lack phenomenal character and lack the specific phenomenal character of hurting). The sole argument in support of the standard view is that it corresponds with the common-sense conception of pain. In this paper we challenge this received doctrine, and with it the standard view of pain, by presenting the results of a series of studies that indicate that lay people tend to hold that unfelt pains are possible.