[The dead end of pain assessment in the oncology clinic]

A priority in cancer care, pain is a symptom that is physically and emotionally intertwined with other issues, making it a real impasse to assess. As a matter of protocol, oncology caregivers tend to measure pain by asking patients to rate it between zero and ten. How can we separate subjective pain from real pain? Subjective pain includes moral, personal and environmental pain, and the difficulty of coping with the new identity of a sick person. Moral pain is inscribed in the body. Oncology management must respond to this assessment by taking a global measure of the patient's subjectivity.