Concept Analysis Paper: Pain Management - Essay Example

Although pain is usually an acute condition following immediately after injury or malfunction of an internal organ, it can be a chronic issue in patients afflicted with terminal disease, especially different types of cancers. Pain relieving pharmacological agents or analgesics offer temporary relief, which is often accompanied with undesirable side effects. Alternative, less invasive techniques to relieve pain include patient counseling, massage, elimination of the precipitating factor and physiotherapy.

Pain management skills are an essential component of good nursing practice, especially for patients with grievous injuries, those in recovery stage after surgery for chronic and neoplastic disorders. Cancer patients with chronic pain usually need cognitive-behavioral strategies to handle the heavy symptom burden they experience (Kwekkeboom et al, 2010). Terminally ill patients with multiple organ failure, cancer and immunodeficiency diseases such as AIDS need special palliative nursing care over a prolonged period, in the clinical setting as well as at home.

For individuals with chronic and terminal ailments, living permanently in nursing homes, it has been discovered that professional training in pain coping skills was beneficial in alleviating symptoms and increasing tolerance (Hyer et al, 2009). Young children are particularly vulnerable to great distress when in pain and need to be handled professionally (Melby, 2011). Pain in children should be managed quickly as well as effectively in order to avoid any short or long-term emotional sequelae (Melby, 2011).

Significance of Concept Pain is an essential component of disease and needs immediate attention of the healthcare professional as it is one of the primary distresses’ which have to be relieved in order to initiate the recommended therapeutic modality for a disorder. Higher incidents of accidents due to the burgeoning population, increased number of aged, terminally ill patients in current hospital environments due to better longevity and patients afflicted with lifestyle diseases like heart ailments, diabetes, hypertension and AIDS present peculiar situations in which pain management acquires great significance in nursing practice.

A nursing practitioner must be well aware of the latest treatment modalities and must take evidence based decisions while choosing therapeutic interventions (Becze, 2010). Alleviation of pain is therefore one of the primary responsibilities of a nursing practitioner. Pain as a phenomenon has been described to be the result of a complex interaction between the actual precipitating physical cause and the sufferer’s psyche (Piotrowski et al, 2003). It is therefore essential to treat pain from a broader perspective, employing drugs as well as psychotherapy.

Actual manifestation of pain is essentially due to interaction of sensory and affective components (Piotrowski et al, 2003). The sensory component includes neuro-humoral mechanisms which convey the sensation from the locus of injury to nociceptive receptors in brain, where the sensation of pain is actually perceived. The sensory component is expressed in relationship to time, intensity, location, pressure and thermal gradients. The affective component of pain involves an emotional context through which the sufferer identifies pain as an unpleasant experience.

Tension, fear and responses in the