Arizona Hospice and Palliative Care Organization
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Resources - Advocacy Position Statements
Statement on Effective Pain Management
AHPCO advocates the precept that all individuals who suffer from pain should have access to treatment modalities that serve to reduce pain and improve the quality of life. This is especially important for individuals who experience pain and suffering as a result of a terminal illness.
To assist in making lasting improvements in pain management by way of government agencies and professional organizations involved in end of life care. To encourage these agencies and organizations to identify and address the barriers to pain management and to improve in professional training, public awareness, funding and provision of pain relief.
An unpleasant sensory and emotional experience associated with actual or potential tissue damage or described in terms of such damage.
Acute Pain:
Acute pain is the normal, predicted physiological response to an adverse chemical, thermal, or mechanical stimulus and is associated with surgery, trauma, or acute illness. It is generally time limited and is responsive to opioid therapy, among other therapies.
Persistent Pain:
A state of pain which is persistent and in which the cause of pain cannot be removed or otherwise treated. Persistent pain may be associated with a long term incurable or intractable medical condition or disease.
Pain is prevalent in cancer and other chronic and life-threatening illnesses. Inadequate pain relief can precipitate increased suffering in all domains of personhood, including physical, psychological, emotional, and spiritual. Moreover, unrelieved pain can result in unnecessary suffering and elicit a desire for a hastened death and/or assisted suicide.
AHPCO strongly supports principles of quality medical practice, which dictate that the people of Arizona have access to appropriate and effective pain relief. AHPCO encourages physicians to view effective pain management as a part of medical practice for all individuals with pain, acute or chronic, with special regard to those who experience pain as a result of a terminal illness. All physicians should become proficient in effective methods of pain treatment. All pain should be assessed and treated aggressively, timely, and effectively.
AHPCO strongly advocates that all Health Care Organizations should address end of life care and this should be inclusive of pain management. Concern for the dying patient’s comfort and dignity should guide all aspects of care during the final stages of life.