Management of Postoperative Pain in Medical Institutions in Shandong Province in China

The aim of the study was to investigate current situation of postoperative pain management in medical institutions in Shandong Province.A questionnaire was developed on the basis of guidelines of acute pain and pain quality assessment scale. The questionnaire was used to obtain information regarding the nature and scale of the medical institution, structure of pain management organization, implementation of pain assessment, and analgesic techniques and processes used in clinical practice. A multistage stratified and cluster sampling method was employed to investigate the current situation of postoperative pain management in 168 medical institutions in Shandong Province. For acute pain service (APS), 32% of the hospitals established postoperative pain management organizations similar to APS. For pain evaluation, 57.1% of the hospitals evaluated pain as the fifth vital sign, and 47.0% of the hospitals evaluated pain at rest and during activity. Furthermore, 43.0% of the surveyed hospitals employed patient-controlled analgesia mode, of which hospitals employing brachial plexus block, lumbar plexus block, and femoral nerve block analgesia accounted for 5.0%, 1.0%, and 4.0%, respectively. The survey revealed that 51.0% of the hospitals educated patients about pain and pain management, of which patients were postoperatively educated by ward nurses in 5.0% and patients were educated by APS during ward rounds in 2.0%. There is a lack of standardized postoperative pain management, the involvement of nurses in pain management is scarce, and the pain assessment and education and application of advanced analgesic management techniques were found to be inadequate in medical institutions in Shandong Province.