Patients give thumbs down to pain treatments
Friday June 11th, 2010
Nearly one in two cancer patients do not take their pain-killing drugs at times of greatest misery, British researchers revealed yesterday.
Specialists said the finding was "remarkable" and showed that current treatments do not meet patient needs.
Dr Andrew Davies, a palliative medicine specialist at the Royal Marsden Hospital, London, said patients faced "incapacitating" episodes of pain.
He reported his findings at the conference of the European Association for Palliative Care in Glasgow, Scotland.
The findings come from the European Survey of Breakthrough Cancer Pain and show that up to 45 per cent of patients do not stick to their medication.
And a similar number sought other ways of finding relief from their misery - including heat, sleep and changing their position.
Patients told researchers they wanted complete and quick relief most of all. They also wanted few side-effects, drugs that were easy to use and treatments that a relative or carer could administer.
The findings come from a study of some 320 patients at nine centres in Britain, Sweden, Denmark and Germany.
Dr Davies said most patients were given opioid pain-killers through the mouth - yet these could take at least an hour to work while a pain crisis might last just three minutes and would last no more than an hour.
Dr Davies said: "Breakthrough pain is a distinct problem, and requires specific interventions including rescue medications that have an appropriately fast onset of action.
"Unfortunately, many patients are being treated with medications that are more suited to the management of persistent pain, and so are not receiving the most appropriate treatment for their breakthrough pain.."
* A second study today warns that family members who care for terminally ill cancer patients need extensive support.
The British Medical Journal article warns that carers often come to feel they are "sharing" the illness.
Professor Scott Murray, of the University of Edinburgh, writes: "Carers, like patients, often felt they were on an emotional rollercoaster, experiencing peaks and troughs at key times of stress and uncertainty in the cancer trajectory."
* Meanwhile another Scottish university has set out find better ways to help sufferers manage chronic pain.
The Aberdeen University research will last for four years.
Dr Pat Schofield, of the Centre for Advanced Studies in Nursing, said: "The overall aim of the study is to achieve a deeper understanding of the consequences of ageing with chronic pain.
"Our findings will enable us to develop innovative ways in which older people have the knowledge, skills and confidence to live independently at home while self managing their pain."
Tags: Cancer | Europe | Pain Relief | UK News
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