Articles: pain-measurement.
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Pain has been difficult to assess because of its multidimensional nature. The primary purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between the nurse's assessment of behavioral cues to pain and self-reports of pain made by patients using patient controlled analgesia (PCA). This descriptive-correlational study used the PACU Behavioral Pain Rating Scale (BPRS), patient's self-report, and hospital's PCA pain-rating scale to investigate pain measurement. ⋯ Significant relationships (rs = 0.56 to 0.80; P < 0.05) were found between the BPRS scores and the self-reports of pain. The relationship between the hospital's PCA pain rating scores and self-reported pain was significant only during the second assessment (rs = 0.45; P < 0.05). The BPRS consistently showed a moderate to high relationship with the patient's self-report of pain and had a stronger relationship with the patient's self-reported pain than with the hospital's pain scale.
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Methods Find Exp Clin Pharmacol · Apr 1994
Antinociceptive effects of ketamine-opioid combinations in the mouse tail flick test.
The antinociceptive activities of intraperitoneal (i.p.) ketamine in combination with subcutaneous (s.c.) morphine or fentanyl were studied using the mouse tail flick test, an acute pain model. Morphine and fentanyl exhibited dose-dependent effects, with respective ED50s (95% confidence limits) of 1.3 (1.2-1.4) mg/kg and 6.8 (6.2-7.4) mcg/kg. Ketamine (1, 5, 10 and 20 mg/kg) showed relatively weak antinociceptive effects with no apparent dose-response relationship. ⋯ Fentanyl (0.5 mcg/kg) pretreatment significantly enhanced ketamine (20 mg/kg) activity, with no apparent effect on ketamine 10 mg/kg. At 2.5 mcg/kg, fentanyl pretreatment significantly enhanced ketamine antinociception. These results suggest that ketamine may not be as effective in acute pain as opioids are, and that after systemic administration, the net effect of ketamine-opioid combination is a simple additive one.
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To determine whether physician estimates of pain severity are influenced by patient ethnicity. ⋯ Physician ability to assess pain severity does not differ for Hispanic and non-Hispanic white patients. Other explanations for a difference in analgesic practice as a function of ethnicity should be explored.
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We investigated pain experienced during burn wound debridement. Forty-nine adult patients with burns and 27 nurses submitted 123 pairs of visual analog scale pain ratings for burn wound debridements. While patients' overall visual analog scale pain scores were found to be evenly distributed, worst pain scores yielded a bimodal distribution with groups centered around means of 2.0 (low pain group) and 7.0 (high pain group). ⋯ According to one researcher's criteria, 53% of nurse pain ratings were accurate. Accuracy of nurses' ratings was unrelated to nursing experience or educational level. Future strategies are presented for comparing high and low pain groups and increasing nurse pain rating accuracy.
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Poorly controlled cancer pain is a significant public health problem throughout the world. There are many barriers that lead to undertreatment of cancer pain. One important barrier is inadequate measurement and assessment of pain. ⋯ It also queries the patient about pain relief, pain quality, and patient perception of the cause of pain. This paper describes the development of the Brief Pain Inventory and the various applications to which the BPI is suited. The BPI is a powerful tool and, having demonstrated both reliability and validity across cultures and languages, is being adopted in many countries for clinical pain assessment, epidemiological studies, and in studies of the effectiveness of pain treatment.