Management of postoperative pain in 164 hospitals in Shandong Province

Abstract

Objective To investigate current situation of postoperative pain mamagement in 164 hospitals in Shandong Province. Methods A questionnaire was developed on the basis of guidelines of acute pain and pain quality assessment. The questionnaire was used to obtain information regarding the nature and scale of the medical institution, the structure of pain management organization, the structure of acute pain service(APS), the model of APS, the implementation of pain assessment, and the analgesic techniques and processes used in clinical practice. A multi-stage stratified and cluster sampling method were employed to investigate the current situation of postoperative pain management in 164 medical institutions in Shandong Province. Results For APS, 32.9% of the hospitals established postoperative pain management organizations similar to APS. For pain evaluation, 58.5% of the hospitals evaluated pain as the fifth vital sign, and 42.7% of the hospitals evaluated pain at rest and during activity. Furthermore, 44.5% of the surveyed hospitals employed patient-controlled analgesia mode, of which hospitals employing brachial plexus block, lumbar plexus block, and femoral nerve block analgesia accounted for 4.9%, 1.2%, and 4.3%, respectively. The survey revealed that 52.4% of the hospitals educated patients about pain and pain management, of which patients were postoperatively educated by ward nurses in 11.0% and patients were educated by APS during ward rounds in 1.2%. Conclusions There is a lack of standardized postoperative pain management. The involvement of nurses in pain management is scarce, and the pain assessment and education and application of advanced analgesic management techniques were found to be inadequate in medical institutions in Shandong Province. Proposed Establish specification evaluation system and postoperative pain management in order to improve the postoperative pain management. Key words: Medical institution; Pain management; Acute pain service