Pain Assessment for Cancer Patients Based on Their Pain Descriptions (part 2)

—Preliminary Study for Selecting Adequate Analgesics and Adjuvant Analgesics using APQ—

Abstract

Pain assessment is important in treating the pain of cancer patients and choosing adequate analgesics for this purpose. Though pain is defined as a subjective phenomenon, it is necessary to evaluate the words chosen by cancer patients to describe their pain objectively. In our previous study (part 1), We developed the Aichi Prefectural Society of Hospital Pharmacists Pain Questionnaire (APQ) based on the McGill Pain Questionnaire (MPQ), a tool for measuring pain based on words used to describe pain.
In order to evaluate pain in thirty-one cancer patients in ten hospitals using the APQ, we investigated the relationship between the words used by patients to describe pain and pain quality (equivalent to the subclasses in APQ) and opioid responsiveness. In addition, we tried to select adequate adjuvant analgesics based on the words for pain in the APQ through a search of the literature. Words used to describe pain and pain quality for pain that is responsive or non-responsive to opioids could be inferred from the seventy-eight pain words in the APQ.
These findings suggest that we can choose adequate medication based on an evaluation of the patient's pain using the APQ and relieve cancer pain successfully.