European study shows terrible impact of breakthrough cancer pain
The first European survey of breakthrough pain in cancer patients was presented at the sixth congress of the European Federation of Chapters of the International Association for the Study of Pain (EFIC). Though previous studies have already looked at the overall management of cancer pain, this was the first international study to examine in detail Breakthrough Cancer Pain (BTCP) from the patient’s perspective.
The first results of the survey looked at the first 200 patients studied from the United Kingdom, Sweden and Denmark. On average, each patient experienced three episodes of BTCP daily, each episode lasting an average of 60 minutes. Patients reported that 96% of these episodes were described as moderate to severe pain. Eighty-seven percent of patients stated that BTCP interfered with activities of daily living – including sleeping, walking and getting on with other people. These results show that breakthrough cancer pain has a very significant impact on the lives of cancer patients.
To treat their BTCP episodes, 98% of the patients in the study used orally administered drugs. It took an average of 20 minutes before patients first noticed a reduction in pain, and an average of 30 minutes before they noticed a real difference with the pain medication – halfway through the typical episode as observed in the study. One of the researchers stated that, while oral opioids are commonly used to treat BTCP, opioids administered intranasally or by other routes may have a significant advantage.
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