Researchers hypothesized that patients would have inaccurate expectations about postoperative pain. Researchers surveyed 223 adults measuring expected pain severity. Patients in postanesthesia care units were asked to rate their pain an hour after a surgery on a standard one-to-10 scale.
Here’s what they found:
1. Mean expected pain for PACU patients was 4.66 ± 0.220.
2. Actual pain experienced was 2.56 ± 0.224.
3. For all other patients, expected pain was 5.45 ± 0.174, while actual pain was 4.30 ± 0.205.
4. When researchers restricted the patient pool to regional anesthesia patients only, expected pain in the PACU was 4.64 ± 0.358, while actual PACU pain was 0.92 ± 0.231.
Researchers concluded patients overestimated how much pain they’d experience, while noting the study provides physicians with an opportunity to increase patient education efforts.
Anesthesiology 2017 was Oct. 21 to Oct. 25 in Boston.
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