Medical students' knowledge and attitude toward cancer pain management in Saudi Arabia

To assess the final year medical students' knowledge, beliefs, and attitude toward cancer pain, and the need for a formal pain curriculum in medical schools.

An epidemiological study was conducted from May 2008 to October 2009 at King Abdulaziz University Hospital, Jeddah, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to assess the students' knowledge and attitude toward cancer pain management. A survey in the form of self-conducted questionnaire was distributed among them.

Response rate was 55% (N=325). Fifty-four percent of the respondents believed that <40% of cancer patients suffered from pain. Forty-six percent of them considered cancer pain as untreatable, while 41.6% considered pain as a minor problem, and 58.6% considered the risk of addiction is high with legitimate opioids' prescription. There are 23.1% of students believed that patients are poor judges of their pain, 68% of them limited opioids prescription to patients with poor prognosis, and 77.1% believed that drug tolerance or psychological dependence, rather than advanced stages' cancer is the cause of increasing analgesic doses. The students' knowledge on the causes of cancer pain, pain clinic rule, and pain inclusion in the medical curriculum was poor. The correlation between personal life experience and respondents' attitude toward cancer pain management did not reveal any statistical significant.

The study revealed poor knowledge and negative attitude of medical students' toward cancer pain. A structured teaching pain program is needed to improve the knowledge and attitude of future doctors toward pain.