Blood transfusion and obesity should be considered individual risk factors for the development of wound infection in patients having orthopaedic oncologic procedures.

Background. Few studies have evaluated the epidemiology and effect of pain in ambulatory patients with cancer who are undergoing active therapy. This information is needed to develop strategies for supportive care in this population. Methods. The prevalence and characteristics of pain were determined in a prospective survey of ambulatory patients with lung or colon cancer. To reduce bias and acquire comprehensive information, the methodology used face‐to‐face interviews by trained quality assurance analysts, a multifaceted assessment instrument, and multivariate statistical analysis. Results. In a telephone interview, “persistent or frequent” pain during the previous 2 weeks was reported by 57 of 145 (39.3%) patients with lung cancer and 52 of 181 (28.7%) patients with colon cancer; 91 of these patients (47 lung and 44 colon) were interviewed in detail. All patients had excellent performance status, and with the exception of pain location, there were no significant differences between the two tumor types. One‐third of the patients had more than one discrete pain. Median pain duration was 4 weeks (range, less than 1 week‐468 weeks), and average pain intensity was moderate. Approximately 90% of patients experienced pain more than 25% of the time. Pain interfered moderately or more with general activity and work in approximately half of the patients; more than half reported moderate or greater pain interference in sleep, mood, and enjoyment of life. Multiple regression analysis revealed that the daily frequency of pain, the intensity of the worst pain, the score on a mood scale, and the frequency of the worst pain accounted for 58.7% of the variance in average pain intensity. Likewise, 52.1% of the variance in a derived measure of pain interference in function was explained by the mood score, frequency of the worst pain, number of pains, and pain intensity. Conclusions. These data indicate that pain is prevalent among well‐functioning ambulatory patients and substantially compromises function in approximately half of the patients who experience it. Pain is a complex symptom; aspects other than intensity, such as frequency, strongly influence its effect.

BACKGROUND: Given the expanding use of oral chemotherapies, the authors set out to examine errors in the prescribing, dispensing, administration, and monitoring of these drugs. METHODS: Reports were collected of oral chemotherapy-associated medication errors from a medical literature and Internet search and review of reports to the Medication Errors Reporting Program and MEDMARX. The authors solicited incident reports from 14 comprehensive cancer centers, and also collected incident reports, pharmacy interventions, and prompted clinician reports from their own center. They classified the type of incident, severity, stage in the medication use process, and type of medication error. They examined the yield of the various reporting methods to identify oral chemotherapy-related medication errors. RESULTS: The authors identified 99 adverse drug events, 322 near misses, and 87 medical errors with low risk of harm. Of the 99 adverse drug events, 20 were serious or life-threatening, 52 were significant, and 25 were minor. The most common medication errors involved wrong dose (38.8%), wrong drug (13.6%), wrong number of days supplied (11.0%), and missed dose (10.0%). The majority of errors resulted in a near miss; however, 39.3% of reports involving the wrong number of days supplied resulted in adverse drug events. Incidents derived from the literature search and hospital incident reporting system included a larger percentage of adverse drug events (73.1% and 58.8%, respectively) compared with other sources. CONCLUSIONS: Ensuring oral chemotherapy safety requires improvements in the way these drugs are ordered, dispensed, administered, and monitored. Cancer 2010;116:2455-64.

Risk factors for surgical site infection in patients with cancer are similar to those found in the National Nosocomial Infections Surveillance System. However, as an individual risk factor among our patient population, obesity contributed as strongly as the surgical procedure category to a patient's likelihood of acquiring a surgical site infection. In addition to Anesthesiology Society of America status, length of the surgical procedure, and surgical procedure category, obesity should warrant consideration as an individual risk factor for surgical site infection.