Enablers And Barriers To Effective Pain Assessment And Management Essay

Enablers And Barriers To Effective Pain Assessment And Management Essay Enablers And Barriers To Effective Pain Assessment And Management â€" Essay Example > IntroductionPain is an indicator that arises to flag out that a sense or an emotion has been traumatized or has been injured, this is especially so when blood, marrow or skin tissue has been damaged (Francoeur, et al, 2007). Pain is an experience that is subject to a particular individual and therefore not transferable to any other person, this aspect makes hard for one to put themselves in the shoes of the sufferer since they cannot understand the pain. The ability to feel pain is important in order to prevent one from injurious situations (Kikwilu, et al, 2008). Pain is usually what one would feel when they cut a finger, pour an antiseptic on a wound or even when a muscle clumps up. In order for a physician to diagnose an illness, assessing pain is crucial in prescribing, proper and efficient management of pain (Upshur, et al, 2006). There are no universal tools to determine the levels or severity of pain, therefore, a physician relies majorly on indicators in both physical and in behaviour. There are various steps and techniques that can be used to identify barriers, how to assess pain (Ward, et al, 2009). These are significant in the process of ensuring proper and efficient assessment of pain. Pain is the first indicator that a patient experiences, it notifies them that everything is not alright, physically, psychologically, spiritually and even emotionally and thus seeking medical attention and opinion. This can be affirmed by more than 35 million medical visits that are done to physicians as recorded in 1984 by Knapp and Koch (Geertzen, et al, 2006). According to International Association for the Study of Pain i. e. (IASP), pain is the unpleasant experience of the senses and emotions that is associated with real or potential damage to the tissues. There has been extensive research as to the understanding of pain in a particular individual’s experience, and the aspects of pain, and how they are influenced by various elements. Therefore, the reasoning is that there is no single physiological contributor to pain as other factors as psyche and issues in society has a part to play in factors that contribute to pain (Upshur, et al, 2006). The sufferer is the only one who can describe what they are undergoing at that particular time since they are the only one experiencing the actual and real pain. There are however, other sources of pain. These include among others, lesions formed after surgeries, and chronic tumours that are non-malignant. In all these scenarios, it is reasonably common for the patient to suffer, complain n report of experiencing acute pain to the physician (Sorkin, 2005) Researchers in the field of pain have traditionally categorized pain as a) acute pain. B) Pain related to cancer and c) Pain groups associated with chronic non-malignant tumours. Acute pain is described and identified as the reaction to trauma or an attack of a disease. In this case, symptoms of pain are seen as a direct proportionate to the ext ent of the disease or injury, or damage to the tissues (Francoeur, et al, 2007). More often than not, researchers have observed over time that symptoms tend to gradually, follow a certain trend over an expected period. This is so to ailments or conditions that may are known to stretch over long periods of time, be it weeks, months and sometimes years. Sorkin (2005) indicates that acute pain may happen in a sudden and are caused by trauma, surgeries or as a result of an acute disease which may go on and on for days and even into weeks. Among examples of acute pains are the unvarying pains like burns, regular or irregular pains i. e. as is in cases where cuts have been made to the stomach.