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Understanding the Cancer Pain Experience

  • Cancer Pain (D Marcus, Section Editor)
  • Published:
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Abstract

Cancer pain management is a major element of successful cancer survivorship. Regardless of where someone is along the cancer experience, from a newly diagnosed patient to long-term survivor, pain is a potential treatment-related effect that can have a significant impact on a survivor’s life. Quality pain management for cancer survivors is complicated by the fact that cancer-related pain can be due to the tumor, surgery, radiation, and/or chemotherapy. Additionally, the pain experience is related to many psychosocial/spiritual factors. Despite almost 40 years of attention devoted to improving cancer pain management, many cancer survivors are less than optimally treated, often owing to survivor and healthcare provider knowledge barriers. This article reviews some of the latest research related to cancer pain management treatment options, measurement/assessment, and interventions. Progress has been made in understanding new aspects of the pain experience, but more work is yet to be done.

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Conflict of Interest

Dr. Judith Schreiber declares no potential conflicts of interest.

Human and Animal Rights and Informed Consent

This article does not contain any studies with human or animal subjects performed by any of the authors.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Louisville, School of Nursing, 555 S. Floyd St., Room 4057, Louisville, KY, 40592, USA

    Judith A. Schreiber

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  1. Judith A. Schreiber
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Correspondence to Judith A. Schreiber.

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This article is part of the Topical Collection on Cancer Pain

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Schreiber, J.A. Understanding the Cancer Pain Experience. Curr Pain Headache Rep 18, 440 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11916-014-0440-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11916-014-0440-5

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