Acute pain management: Implications of scientific evidence for nursing practice in the postoperative context
- 1 August 2001
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Wiley in International Journal of Nursing Practice
- Vol. 7 (4), 266-273
- https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1440-172x.2001.00309.x
Abstract
Unrelieved acute pain remains prevalent in hospitalized patients despite advances in pain management. A decade after the Australian National Health and Medical Research Council called for improved pain management practices by health professionals, it released clinical guidelines to provide clinicians with current scientific evidence to augment their clinical decision-making. This paper examines the implications of national guidelines on nursing practice and highlights the inadequacies of current implementation policies. Pain management guidelines have failed to decrease patients' postoperative pain because organizations and researchers have ignored the impact of contextual influences on clinicians' decision-making. It is recommended that for successful implementation of national guidelines to occur at the local level of practice, organizations must assist clinicians to identify local influences on their decision-making, to address the issues specific to their own work environment and to evaluate any changes in practice.Keywords
This publication has 35 references indexed in Scilit:
- Vital Signs: Manage Pain ProactivelyThe American Journal of Nursing, 1999
- The prevalence and perception of pain amongst hospital in‐patientsJournal of Clinical Nursing, 1998
- Anticipating and experiencing post‐operative pain: the patients' perspectiveJournal of Clinical Nursing, 1997
- Pain management knowledge, attitudes and clinical practice: The impact of nurses' characteristics and educationJournal of Pain and Symptom Management, 1996
- Mutlilevel theory of team decision making: Decision performance in teams incorporating distributed expertise.Journal of Applied Psychology, 1995
- Failure of pain relief after surgeryAnaesthesia, 1994
- Effect of clinical guidelines on medical practice: a systematic review of rigorous evaluationsThe Lancet, 1993
- Policy for controlling pain after surgery: effect of sequential changes in management.BMJ, 1992
- Pain and addiction: An urgent need for change in nursing educationJournal of Pain and Symptom Management, 1992
- Assessing patients'pain: identifying reasons for errorJournal of Advanced Nursing, 1991