首页 | 本学科首页   官方微博 | 高级检索  
     


Cancer pain management at home (I): do older patients experience less effective management than younger patients?
Authors:Michael I. Bennett  S. José Closs  John Chatwin
Affiliation:(1) International Observatory on End of Life Care, Bowland Tower East, Institute for Health Research, Lancaster University, Lancaster, LA1 4YT, UK;(2) University of Leeds, Leeds, UK
Abstract:Goals of work  We wanted to examine whether older cancer patients living at home experienced poorer pain management than younger patients, and if so, what were the potential explanations for this. Materials and methods  We interviewed 90 new referrals to community palliative care services who were aged 75 years and above or aged 60 years and below. We asked about pain intensity, pain relief and pain quality, access to and type of analgesic medication and, finally, sources of support and self-management strategies. Main results  Older and younger cancer patients who were living at home had very similar experiences of pain, pain relief, access to and use of analgesia, contact with health care professionals and use of additional pain management strategies. As a whole, participants had more frequent contact with family members, community nurses and pharmacists than with general practitioners. Conclusions  In this sample, the experience and management of pain in older cancer patients was no different from that in younger patients. This suggests that delivering improvements in cancer pain management in the community is appropriate for all age groups. In addition, focussing efforts on patients, carers and non-medical health care professionals may prove to be the most successful strategy.
Keywords:Cancer pain  Analgesia  Ageing  Palliative care
本文献已被 SpringerLink 等数据库收录!
设为首页 | 免责声明 | 关于勤云 | 加入收藏

Copyright©北京勤云科技发展有限公司  京ICP备09084417号