Pain

Pain is the most common reason individuals seek medical attention. According to the American Pain Society (APS), 50 million Americans are partially or totally disabled by pain, and 45% of all Americans seek care for persistent pain at some point in their lives.

Pain is reported to be twice as prevalent in the elderly as in younger individuals and in nursing homes chronic pain in the long-term care setting is often under-recognized and under-treated. Many individuals enter a nursing home or post-acute care facility with pain or a condition that causes them to have pain. Direct care staff and practitioners should be aware of the possibilities for pain and should look for related signs and symptoms. Cognitively impaired individuals, or those with impaired communication, may not be able to communicate pain symptoms adequately, or may have atypical symptoms. For various cultural and personal reasons, people may not report pain adequately or may deny having pain. It is recommended that staff ask about pain whenever they measure vital signs.

Current Work

Pain relief is a integral part of palliative care, which customizes treatment to meet the needs of each individual, seeking to relieve pain, anxiety, shortness of breath, fatigue, nausea, loss of appetite, and other symptoms. Practitioners of palliative care help patients and their families understand treatment options, and facilitate effective communication among health care professionals, patients, and family members. Emotional and spiritual support for the patient and family are hallmarks of palliative care. Stratis Health is convening the Minnesota Rural Health Palliative Care Initiative.

Resources

Educational Recorded Webinar sessions sponsored by Stratis Health are available on a variety of topics, e.g. clinical topics, quality improvement, organizational change, using data, staff and resident satisfaction, etc., sortable by date, topic, and health care setting.

Advancing Excellence in America's Nursing Homes Campaign has identified pain one of its eight goals for improving care in nursing homes. Nursing homes choose three goals to focus on and those that choose pain will work to see that nursing home residents will receive appropriate care to prevent and minimize episodes of moderate or severe pain. The objectives for long stay and short stay residents are slightly different. The Campaign provides resources for nursing homes to use when working toward improving their care around pain and other priority areas.

ConsultGeriRN.org Nursing Standard of Practice Protocol: Pain Management in Older Adults

Geriatric Pain Web site was created to provide nurses who workin long-term care environments with access tofree best-practice pain assessment tools and resources to help manage pain in older adults, including quality improvement processes focused on pain management.

Evidence to Practice E2P is a online resource designed to provide access to ranked evidence and evidence-based strategies for managing care in a variety of important areas, including pain.

Contact Stratis Health for assistance with your quality improvement and patient safety needs.

If your organization has projects it would like to work on, contact us to discuss how we can work together to support your work.