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Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
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| Long term patterns of morphine dosage and pain intensity among cancer patients | | Author(s) | Paul Sloan, Ronald Melzack |
| Journal title | The Hospice Journal, vol 14, no 2, 1999 |
| Pages | pp 35-48 |
| Source | Haworth Document Delivery Center, The Haworth Press Inc., 10 Alice Street, Binghamton, NY 13904-1580, USA. |
| Keywords | Drugs ; Cancer ; Pain ; In-patients ; Terminal care ; Clinical surveys ; Canada. |
| Annotation | It is believed that people who receive daily doses of morphine to relieve chronic cancer-related pain develop relatively little tolerance to the drug's analgesic effects. This study documents morphine intake of 17 patients (mean age 59) with chronic cancer pain in the palliative care unit at the Royal Victoria Hospital, Montreal over a 64-week period. Those receiving morphine for 30 days or longer and able to complete the pain scale were included. Those with a confused or clouded censorium were excluded. Daily pain intensity was measured by the PPI (0-5 scale) of the McGill pain questionnaire, followed up for a mean of 82 days. Mean daily dosage at study entry was 135 mg, and at study completion 244 mg. There was no evidence that any patient rapidly developed tolerance to morphine. Pain was well controlled for most patients. 10 of the patients reported 93% of their PPI scores as 0 or 1; 4 of these reported occasional breakthrough pain. 4 other patients reported 18% of scores as either 2 (discomforting) or 3 (disturbing). The other 3 patients spent more than 4 months in the unit and had less than good pain control. More than 82% of patients' chronic cancer-related pain was well controlled with oral morphine as a main therapy. (RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-990723222 A |
| Classmark | LLD: CK: CT7: LF7: LV: 3G: 7S |
Data © Centre for Policy on Ageing |
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| ...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing. |
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