Did you know most chronic pain among older adults often goes under-treated or mismanaged, which significantly affects their overall life quality? This issue can be resolved by prioritizing effective pain management with the help of certain strategies. Learn effective ways of pain management in the elderly, points, and precautions to consider in this article. Log on to www.doralhw.org for a consultation.

Effective ways of pain management in the elderly

Several ways can effectively help to manage pain in the elderly, including:

1. Assessment of pain:

Assessing pain is an essential approach to finding the source, location, and severity of pain; and the capacity of the patient to manage chronic pain (especially among older adults). Evaluating allows doctors to tailor interventions and create personalized treatment plans that optimize relief and improve life quality. The assessment also helps to find any pathologic pain promoters associated with advanced age. Any kind of mental health issue may make the management of the symptoms more difficult. There are several important factors to consider like the patient may develop adverse effects from multiple medications; the imaging test is symptom or examination-driven; and duplication of previous testing may cause stress on the patient’s body.

2. Pharmacological management:

Pharmacological interventions are crucial for chronic pain management, especially in older adults. That’s why doctors make careful consideration of medications, their potential interactions, and age-related changes to ensure that the medications prescribed don’t cause any side effects and monitor them to achieve appropriate pain relief while lowering the risks in the population.

The first approach is non-opioid drugs; acetaminophen for mild and persistent pain, NSAIDs for managing inflammation, antidepressants, or anticonvulsants to manage neuropathic pain. These medications are prescribed based on your health and requirements so that you don’t experience any side effects.

If your pain ranges from moderate to advanced, then opioids are recommended to manage continuous pain; these are long-acting medicines. The elderly are more sensitive to opioids due to their age-related physiologic changes along with comorbid medical conditions. That’s why alternative therapy is also recommended for equal or better the results of pain control, functional restoration, and improvement of quality of life.

3. Non-pharmacological means:

These techniques are effective in managing chronic pain in older adults. It often has low cost and lower side effects. It includes – physical therapy, occupational therapy, acupuncture, chiropractic treatments, and massage therapy. These options offer holistic pain relief along with enhancing mobility, strengthening muscles, promoting flexibility, and improving senior’s overall well-being and independence. These treatments are believed to reduce medications and their side effects.

Precautions and points to consider

When pain management treatment is prescribed, there are several precautions and points you should consider:

• If you lead an active, fulfilling life in your senior years by making healthy lifestyle choices and eating healthy then pain management can improve your life quality. However, you can’t manage factors like genetics, chronic conditions, injuries, medication, and mental health. That’s why you should consider support systems, proactive health management, and regular follow-ups with your healthcare provider to ensure healthy aging.
• Finding the source of pain and its impact on the patient is essential for providing appropriate treatment. All your previous consultations, workups, and imaging studies need to be assessed for diagnosis. This also helps to detect suspicious pain increase like pathologic pain promoters that occur with advanced age.
• Assessment and management of symptoms can be difficult if you have cognitive impairment due to delirium, dementia, or other mental health conditions.
• If you have complicated emotional issues, then pain may be diffuse or inconsistent in nature.
• Polypharmacy is common in older patients; that’s why you should be aware of multiple medications’ adverse effects.
• Management of symptoms follows the same principles in older patients and younger patients. However, older patients are more sensitive to medication side effects compared to younger patients.
• If you have chronic, non-cancer pain then it is more likely to get lowered than eliminated, so ongoing pain is a probability.
• If your loved ones have advanced dementia where they are not able to communicate verbally about pain, then they may need evaluation by facial expressions, verbal cues, body movements, interpersonal interaction changes, activity patterns, and routines like sleep disruption and appetite suppression. Multiple questionnaires increase the success rate in diagnosing pain levels in dementia patients.
• Patients with dementia might strike out, refuse to take medications, show agitation, delirium, increased restlessness, and/or social withdrawal. This type of acute decline may occur due to infections, metabolic, medication-related, and social-situation changes.
• Prescribing a trial of scheduled medications is a stepwise approach for dementia patients.
  • Start low, go slow, to be aware of being under treatment.
  • Monitor the patient carefully to examine the risks and benefits of the treatment.
• Make sure you are aware of herbal and dietary supplements taken by older patients. This may lead to drug-supplement interactions.
• If patients don’t respond to one medication, they may respond to another, making sure to keep track of their progress.
• Take care of your elderly because they are at higher risk of side effects. For example, if they take an aspirin regularly for chronic pain then it may cause a dangerous bleeding stomach ulcer.
• When buying over-the-counter pain medicines, make sure you talk to your pharmacist about any prescription and complementary medication you should be taking to make pain medicine safe for you.
• Don’t take more than one OTC medicine at a time without consulting your doctor first because you unintentionally might take an overdose which can be harmful.
• Get proper treatment from a doctor for sports injuries.
• Consult your doctor or pharmacist before taking any OTC medicine if you have chronic physical conditions like heart disease and diabetes.

Pain management in seniors can be difficult because of declining health and them being more prone to medication side effects. That’s why you should follow the above-mentioned effective ways to manage pain and take precautions to ensure they get the benefits of pain relief and improve life quality and functionality.

Need help with pain management for seniors, visit our pain management clinic in Brooklyn to get professional medical diagnosis and treatment that loved ones need for pain management and to improve their life quality. Call us to book your appointment now for timely medical attention!!!! Your pain needs professional assistance, visit our pain management clinic in Brooklyn today or call to get a consultation. The location at 1797 Pitkin Avenue, Brooklyn, NY 11212 is well-served by public transportation, including many bus routes, and the subway line. Visit our website at http://www.painmanagementbrooklyn.com/ or contact us on +1-347-384-5690 for additional details.