Some considerations on the pharmacological treatment of pain

Drug treatment of pain is largely based on clinical experience. Some aspects of the analgesic therapy with drugs are discussed on the hand of data, selected from the scientific literature, or obtained by own experimental work done in the pain clinic of Leuven. The choice of the analgesic compound and some valuable drug combinations are reviewed. Possibilities for the evaluation of the analgesic efficacy, other as the simple but most important verbal report, are mentioned. Problems, associated with a prolonged analgesic drug therapy, are discussed. (Acta anaesth. belg., 1981, 32, 13-20).