Journal of pain & palliative care pharmacotherapy
-
J Pain Palliat Care Pharmacother · Jan 2003
Pain and palliative care in The Cochrane Library: Issue Number 3 for 2002.
The Cochrane Library of systematic reviews is published quarterly. Six of the 62 new reviews published in Issue 4 for 2001 in February 2002 are relevant to pain and palliative care. Annotated bibliographies for those nine reviews are provided.
-
J Pain Palliat Care Pharmacother · Jan 2003
Pain and palliative care for people living with HIV/AIDS in Asia.
Millions of people living with HIV/AIDS (PLHA) in Asia need access to palliative care as part of a comprehensive response to their support needs. There are many causes of pain in HIV/AIDS, and its prevalence is as high if not higher than in cancer, but it is frequently undertreated. ⋯ These include few care and support services, lack of recognition and acknowledgement of pain in HIV/AIDS by health care professionals, widespread stigma and discrimination especially towards vulnerable groups such as injecting drug users, government regulatory mechanisms which make access to opioids even more difficult for the care services which have developed and a lack of understanding of or advocacy for pain relief and palliative care in the literature on HIV/AIDS care and support. During the growth of palliative care in Asia, there is opportunity for advocates of palliative care and care for PLHA to collaborate to influence national policy.
-
J Pain Palliat Care Pharmacother · Jan 2003
Palliative care in developing countries: why research is needed.
Contemporary medical knowledge is sufficient to control the suffering of most of the millions of terminally patients in the world if applied appropriately. However, palliative care is still unavailable to most patients in developing countries. Effective models of palliative care delivery that have been tested in developed countries seldom apply to the developing world where poverty, extended families, and insufficient health infrastructure require the adaptation of such care to local cultures and circumstances. ⋯ Palliative care research shares most of the obstacles common to health research in the developing world. Additional obstacles include a lack of consideration of palliative care as part of cancer control strategies and the low political acceptability of such care because it involves the use of opioid analgesics. Coordinated research efforts through active networking and common protocols would increase the visibility of the discipline, provide answers relevant to the local contexts, and assist in expanding palliative care services across the developing world.
-
J Pain Palliat Care Pharmacother · Jan 2003
Pain relief in the developing world: the experience of hospice Africa-Uganda.
The need for high quality end-of-life care in the developing world is increasingly becoming recognized. One of the core parts of such a service is adequate pain control. Poor health care infrastructures and lack of access to opioid analgesics are common problems. ⋯ This paper discusses some of the challenges encountered and how these have been addressed. These include access to opioids, educating of health care workers and influencing policy makers. Factors that have been important in making the service a success, such as choosing an appropriate model of care, and future directions for the organization are discussed.
-
J Pain Palliat Care Pharmacother · Jan 2003
ReviewSymptom management in cancer: pain, depression and fatigue: State-of-the-Science Conference Statement.
NIH Consensus Statements are prepared by a nonadvocate, non-Federal panel of experts, based on (1) presentations by investigators working in areas relevant to the consensus questions during a 2 day public session; (2) questions and statements from conference attendees during open discussion periods that are part of the public session; and (3) closed deliberations by the panel during the remainder of the second day and morning of the third. This statement is an independent report of the panel and is not a policy statement of the NIH or the Federal Government. ⋯ Thus, it provides a "snapshot in time" of the state of knowledge on the conference topic. When reading the statement, keep in mind that new knowledge is inevitably accumulating through medical research.