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Journal of Clinical Oncology, Vol 25, No 13 (May 1), 2007: pp. 1792-1801 © 2007 American Society of Clinical Oncology. DOI: 10.1200/JCO.2006.07.9038
Pain Management in Hospitalized Cancer Patients: A Systematic Review
From the Division of Hematology and Medical Oncology, Samuel Bronfman Department of Medicine; Hertzberg Palliative Care Institute of the Brookdale Department of Geriatrics and Adult Development, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York; and The Bronx/NY Harbor Geriatric Research, Education, and Clinical Center, Bronx, NY Address reprint requests to R. Sean Morrison, MD, Brookdale Department of Geriatrics, Box 1070, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, One Gustave L. Levy Pl, New York, NY 10029; e-mail: sean.morrison{at}mssm.edu Purpose To assist cancer centers in improving pain management, we conducted a systematic review of institutional interventions designed to improve the assessment and treatment of pain in hospitalized cancer patients. Methods We performed a MEDLINE search for all English-language articles published from January 1966 through February 2006 using the medical subject headings terms of pain or pain measurement and outcome assessment (health care) or quality assurance (health care). Selected bibliographies were also searched. Studies were reviewed if they included clinical interventions directed at improving the treatment of cancer pain across an institution or nursing unit. Meta-analyses and randomized controlled trials or other controlled studies were included where possible. If no such trials were identified, then the best evidence available from studies with other designs was included. Results Five interventions were identified. These interventions included professional and patient education, instituting regular pain assessment (pain as a vital sign), audit of pain results and feedback to clinical staff, computerized decisional support systems, and specialist-level pain consultation services. Most studies were small in size and used quasiexperimental pre-post test designs. Successes were reported in increasing patient satisfaction, increasing documentation of pain intensity, and improving nurses knowledge and attitudes. No study reported successful interventions that consistently improved patients pain severity. Conclusion Although professional knowledge and attitudes about pain and nursing pain assessment rates have been shown to be improvable, no systematic, hospital-wide intervention has yet to be associated with improvement in pain severity. Future research on the development of new interventions, perhaps targeted specifically at physicians, is urgently needed. Supported by Mid-Career Investigator Award in Patient Oriented Research No. K24 AG022345 from the National Institute on Aging (R.S.M.); also supported in part by the National Palliative Care Research Center, New York, NY. Authors disclosures of potential conflicts of interest and author contributions are found at the end of this article.
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Copyright © 2007 by the American Society of Clinical Oncology, Online ISSN: 1527-7755. Print ISSN: 0732-183X
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