Pain management at inpatient wards of a university hospital

This is an exploratory, descriptive and transversal study aiming to determine the prevalence, characterization, location, and measurement and discuss pharmacological analgesic measures for acute pain management in five inpatient wards of a university hospital.

We enrolled 856 subjects in the study, of whom 272 were in pain at the time. Information related to pain was obtained using a bedside structured interview. Numeric pain scale and body diagram were used.

Analgesia was assessed through medical records. The overall prevalence of pain was 31.8%, with severe pain in 44.2% and mean of 6.6 on numeric pain scale. The main reason was trauma and the most common site the abdomen. The most widely used analgesic was dipyrone (76.1%) with/without combination. Strong opioid was prescribed to 4.4%. For 27.5% there was no improvement.

We conclude that pain is highly prevalent, poorly evaluated, undertreated, with inappropriate use of analgesics.