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The Stigma Surrounding Opioid Use as a Barrier to Cancer-Pain Management: An Overview of Experiences with Fear, Shame, and Poorly Controlled Pain in the Context of Advanced Cancer
Cancer-related pain affects a majority of patients with advanced cancer and is often undertreated. The treatment of this pain is largely reliant on the use of opioids, which are essential medicines for symptom management and the maintenance of quality of life (QoL) for patients with advanced cancer....
Autores principales: | , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
MDPI
2023
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10296997/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37366920 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/curroncol30060437 |
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author | Harsanyi, Hannah Cuthbert, Colleen Schulte, Fiona |
author_facet | Harsanyi, Hannah Cuthbert, Colleen Schulte, Fiona |
author_sort | Harsanyi, Hannah |
collection | PubMed |
description | Cancer-related pain affects a majority of patients with advanced cancer and is often undertreated. The treatment of this pain is largely reliant on the use of opioids, which are essential medicines for symptom management and the maintenance of quality of life (QoL) for patients with advanced cancer. While there are cancer-specific guidelines for the treatment of pain, widespread publication and policy changes in response to the opioid epidemic have drastically impacted perceptions of opioid use. This overview therefore aims to investigate how manifestations of opioid stigma impact pain management in cancer settings, with an emphasis on the experiences of patients with advanced cancer. Opioid use has been widely stigmatized in multiple domains, including public, healthcare, and patient populations. Physician hesitancy in prescribing and pharmacist vigilance in dispensing were identified as barriers to optimal pain management, and may contribute to stigma in the context of advanced cancer. Evidence in the literature suggests that opioid stigma may result in patient deviations from prescription instructions, which generally leads to pain undertreatment. Patients reflected on experiencing shame and fear surrounding their prescription opioid use and feeling uncomfortable communicating with their healthcare providers on these topics. Our findings indicate that future work is required to educate patients and providers in order to de-stigmatize opioid use. Through alleviating stigma, patients may be better able to make decisions regarding their pain management which lead to freedom from cancer-related pain and improved QoL. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-10296997 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2023 |
publisher | MDPI |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-102969972023-06-28 The Stigma Surrounding Opioid Use as a Barrier to Cancer-Pain Management: An Overview of Experiences with Fear, Shame, and Poorly Controlled Pain in the Context of Advanced Cancer Harsanyi, Hannah Cuthbert, Colleen Schulte, Fiona Curr Oncol Review Cancer-related pain affects a majority of patients with advanced cancer and is often undertreated. The treatment of this pain is largely reliant on the use of opioids, which are essential medicines for symptom management and the maintenance of quality of life (QoL) for patients with advanced cancer. While there are cancer-specific guidelines for the treatment of pain, widespread publication and policy changes in response to the opioid epidemic have drastically impacted perceptions of opioid use. This overview therefore aims to investigate how manifestations of opioid stigma impact pain management in cancer settings, with an emphasis on the experiences of patients with advanced cancer. Opioid use has been widely stigmatized in multiple domains, including public, healthcare, and patient populations. Physician hesitancy in prescribing and pharmacist vigilance in dispensing were identified as barriers to optimal pain management, and may contribute to stigma in the context of advanced cancer. Evidence in the literature suggests that opioid stigma may result in patient deviations from prescription instructions, which generally leads to pain undertreatment. Patients reflected on experiencing shame and fear surrounding their prescription opioid use and feeling uncomfortable communicating with their healthcare providers on these topics. Our findings indicate that future work is required to educate patients and providers in order to de-stigmatize opioid use. Through alleviating stigma, patients may be better able to make decisions regarding their pain management which lead to freedom from cancer-related pain and improved QoL. MDPI 2023-06-17 /pmc/articles/PMC10296997/ /pubmed/37366920 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/curroncol30060437 Text en © 2023 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). |
spellingShingle | Review Harsanyi, Hannah Cuthbert, Colleen Schulte, Fiona The Stigma Surrounding Opioid Use as a Barrier to Cancer-Pain Management: An Overview of Experiences with Fear, Shame, and Poorly Controlled Pain in the Context of Advanced Cancer |
title | The Stigma Surrounding Opioid Use as a Barrier to Cancer-Pain Management: An Overview of Experiences with Fear, Shame, and Poorly Controlled Pain in the Context of Advanced Cancer |
title_full | The Stigma Surrounding Opioid Use as a Barrier to Cancer-Pain Management: An Overview of Experiences with Fear, Shame, and Poorly Controlled Pain in the Context of Advanced Cancer |
title_fullStr | The Stigma Surrounding Opioid Use as a Barrier to Cancer-Pain Management: An Overview of Experiences with Fear, Shame, and Poorly Controlled Pain in the Context of Advanced Cancer |
title_full_unstemmed | The Stigma Surrounding Opioid Use as a Barrier to Cancer-Pain Management: An Overview of Experiences with Fear, Shame, and Poorly Controlled Pain in the Context of Advanced Cancer |
title_short | The Stigma Surrounding Opioid Use as a Barrier to Cancer-Pain Management: An Overview of Experiences with Fear, Shame, and Poorly Controlled Pain in the Context of Advanced Cancer |
title_sort | stigma surrounding opioid use as a barrier to cancer-pain management: an overview of experiences with fear, shame, and poorly controlled pain in the context of advanced cancer |
topic | Review |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10296997/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37366920 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/curroncol30060437 |
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