Prevalence of pain in a hospital with acute and chronic pain units: the next step... translational analgesia

Abstract

[eng] Acute and chronic pain units in hospitals do not guarantee a low prevalence of pain, either in the center or in its area of influence in primary care. The goal is to obtain 'translational' analgesia in order to decrease the impact of pain. The present study reports data on the prevalence of pain in our institution (Hospital Son Llatzer, Palma de Mallorca, Spain). The Anesthesia Department has Chronic and Acute Pain Units, with continuing education and intra- and extra-hospital research into pain performed by physicians and nurses. Nevertheless, the prevalence of pain intensity ≥ 6 measured with a visual analog scale (VAS) was almost 25% among the inpatients studied. More than 30% (33-36%) of inpatients reported moderate to unbearable pain. Rescue or on-demand analgesia seemed to be significantly worse on weekends and public holidays than on working days, probably due to the lower number of health professionals working on those days. On weekends and holidays, 4.56% of the patients reported a VAS of 10. Strategic actions are still required to decrease the prevalence of pain in our milieu. Among these actions, we propose an analgesic default protocol, graded according to pain intensity and origin, and under facilitated prescription.