Page 66 - Psychology of Wounds and Wound Care in Clinical Practice ( PDFDrive )

Assessing Pain 39

Assessing Pain

Due to the negative impact of pain (and stress) on the rate of
a patient’s healing process and quality of life, assessing and
measuring this is fundamental during the wound care process.
It is essential that pain is assessed, managed and re-assessed
regularly during a patient’s treatment (Soon and Acton
2006 ). The need for consideration of pain on an individual
patient basis has been highlighted by the World Union of
Wound Healing Societies:

Every person and every wound should have an individualised
management plan: uncontrolled pain should signal an immediate
adjustment to the plan. Wounds differ in their origins and pros-
pects of healing, which has potential implications for the likeli-
hood and severity of pain experienced, and should guide the
choice of treatment options and strategies used in dressing
related procedures. The aims is to treat all causes of pain and the
clinicians will need to consider the patient’s level of background
and incident pain prior to any clinical intervention. (WUWHS
2004 )
In implementing some form of assessment tool developed
to measure pain, a clinician is aware of both the pain and
stress experienced by their patient, enabling them to focus
more specifically on contributing factors. This, subsequently,
can aid the patient’s rate of healing. As such, a patient-
centred assessment can provide the clinician with a sensitive
and effective tool for the management of wound-related pain
(Upton and Solowiej 2010 ). Not only is it important for clini-
cians to adopt formal assessments, but it is also important for
them to acknowledge individual patient behaviours; both
verbal and non-verbal (see Table 2.3 for a non-verbal check-
list). These behaviours can be indicative of instances of pain,
whilst also enabling professionals to understand the varying
levels of pain patients are experiencing during their wound-
care (Upton and Solowiej 2010 ).
Clinicians have a number of self-report pain measures that
they can adopt in their wound care and treatment regime
(some, of which, will be outlined below). These measures