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Solving the deficit of cancer pain management skills by education programs

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Abstract

Background

Suboptimal cancer pain management is a worldwide problem. We examined whether an educational program on cancer pain management implemented during training could benefit primary care physicians.

Methods

We enrolled all the primary care physicians who visited the oncology ward at a medical center for the first time. Educational classes on cancer pain management were conducted. The participants’ abilities in cancer pain management were measured in a pretest before the classes and approximately 2 weeks later in the first posttest. The second posttest was conducted on participants who visited the oncology ward again. All 3 tests had the same set of questions and were scored on a scale of 0 to 100.

Results

In total, 247 participants were enrolled. Less than 10% of them considered their previous education on cancer pain management adequate. The test scores increased significantly from the pretest to the first posttest (mean 65.6 vs. 89.7, p < 0.001). The participants’ self-reported cancer pain management abilities, on a scale of 0 to 100, also improved significantly (mean 57.8 vs. 75.5, p < 0.001). The pretest scores were not associated with the participants’ self-reported abilities or their perceptions about the adequacy of previous training on cancer pain management. The mean score on the second posttest, conducted 234.5 days after the program, on an average, remained similar to that of the first posttest (p = 0.254).

Conclusion

A specific educational program on cancer pain management provided to primary care physicians improved their pain management skills substantially, with persistent effects.

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Availability of data and material

All data of this study have been included in this article.

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Funding

This study was supported by grants from the Ministry of Science and Technology, Taiwan (MOST-103-2314-B-002-181-MY2, MOST -103-2314-B-002-092, MOST 104-2314-B-002-073, MOST-105-2314-B-002-194, MOST 106-2314-B-002-213, and MOST 108-2314-B-002-072-MY3) and National Taiwan University Hospital (NTUH. 105S2954, NTUH. 106-S3596, NTUH, 108-S4150, and NCTRC201603).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Graduate Institute of Oncology, College of Medicine, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan

    Yu-Yun Shao, Li-Chun Lu & Chih-Hung Hsu

  2. Department of Medical Oncology, National Taiwan University Cancer Center, Taipei, Taiwan

    Yu-Yun Shao, Li-Chun Lu & Chih-Hung Hsu

  3. Department of Oncology, National Taiwan University Hospital, 7 Chung-Shan South Road, Taipei, 10002, Taiwan

    Yu-Yun Shao, Chih-Peng Lin, Li-Chun Lu & Chih-Hung Hsu

  4. Department of Anesthesiology, National Taiwan University Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan

    Wen-Ying Lin & Chih-Peng Lin

Authors
  1. Yu-Yun Shao
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  2. Wen-Ying Lin
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  3. Chih-Peng Lin
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  4. Li-Chun Lu
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  5. Chih-Hung Hsu
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Contributions

Conceptualization, YYS; methodology, YYS, WYL, and CPL; formal analysis and investigation, YYS; and writing, YYS, LCL, and CHH.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Yu-Yun Shao.

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Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Ethics approval

This study was approved by the Research Ethics Committee of National Taiwan University Hospital.

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Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

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Patients signed informed consent regarding publishing their data.

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Shao, YY., Lin, WY., Lin, CP. et al. Solving the deficit of cancer pain management skills by education programs. Support Care Cancer 29, 1843–1848 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00520-020-05651-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00520-020-05651-2

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