[Postoperative pain in an urology department: evaluation by patients and by nurses]

A survey conducted in an urological ward of an Italian hospital, has studied the frequency of pain and altered vital signs connected with pain, in the first 36 postoperative hours. Aim of the study was to locate possible differences between pain assessment performed by patients and nurses. 30 patients operated of urological major surgery have been studied. More altered vital sings are pulse and blood pressure, instead respiration is more altered during the night. Pain is most important in the first 24 hours, particularly at 6 a.m. in the first day after surgery. For patients the most painful operation is radical prostatectomy. Nurses had generally substimated pain; only in the 22% of cases there was agreement with the patients, but with they were agreed that the most painful surgical operation is radical prostatectomy. Vital signs alterations are connected with pain peak only in the 25.36% of cases.