Outcome of cancer pain consultations.

Overview

BACKGROUND: All major cancer centers in the United States are equipped with pain management consultation services. We report on the outcome of such consultations within 24 hours from the intervention. METHODS: All consecutive patients referred to the pain management service of a tertiary care cancer center were assessed before and 14-24 hours after the intervention. RESULTS: A total of 45 patients completed the study. The mean current pain intensity score was 5.2 on the Visual Analogue Scale before the consultation and 2.7 after the consultation (P < 0.05). The pain was described as excruciating on the Categorical Scale by three patients before the consultation and by no patients after the consultation. CONCLUSIONS: In hospitalized cancer patients with difficult to control pain, cancer pain consultations result in a measurable effect within 24 hours of the pharmacologic intervention. To avoid unnecessary suffering, timeliness is of the utmost importance when requesting and delivering cancer pain consultations.