Clinical Consequences of Inadequate Pain Management and Barriers to Optimal Pain Management

Abstract

This chapter assesses the experience of pain from the perspective of the patient and the physician. Pain is defined, and the controversy of its undertreatment and the resulting physiologic, sociologic, and economic consequences are examined. Patient and physician-limiting barriers to treatment are listed, and modern methods for preventing inadequate pain management are discussed. Not every physician is comfortable treating pain, and the physician who attempts to mitigate it may face patients’ discontent. This chapter reveals what stands in the way of the modern physician’s attempt to manage pain and strategies that can be taken to overcome these barriers.