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S U P P L E M E N T T O O U T P AT I E N T S U R G E R Y M A G A Z I N E O N L I N E | J U LY 2 0 1 4
P
ain is known as the 5
th
vital
sign, but unlike heart rate,
blood pressure, respiratory
rate and temperature, you
can't measure pain —
unless you count the Wong-Baker Faces
Pain Rating Scale, its happy-to-sad faces
going from smiling (0, no hurt) to frown-
ing and teary (10, hurts worst). You can,
however, prevent and manage the highly
How Do You Control
Post-Op Pain?
No two anesthesia providers
manage the 5
th
vital sign in
the same way.
Dan O'Connor | Editor-in-Chief
NO COOKBOOK ANSWERS
Pain control is highly variable.
Pamela
Bevelhymer,
RN,
BSN
P O S T - O P E R A T I V E P A I N
subjective symptom of surgery
before, during and after the proce-
dure. How you do so is highly vari-
able, depending not only on the type
of procedure, the patient and the
surgeon, but also on the anesthesia
provider's training, his philosophy
and his success rates with different
interventions.
All of this makes pain management
an unpredictable science. Ask 10
anesthesia providers for their No. 1
strategy for preventing post-opera-
tive pain, and you're likely to get 10
different answers. Whereas some
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