
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, March 6, 1992                   TAG: 9203060150
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Short

PAIN-CONTROL PROCEDURES TARGETED

Federal health officials recommended Thursday that surgery patients be given more drugs to control pain than they typically get now, saying that under-medication results in unnecessary suffering, slower recovery and prolonged hospital stays.

In a series of guidelines expected to change the way the medical community treats post-surgical pain, the federal government said both adults and children need higher and more frequent doses of pain-killers delivered earlier than is current standard practice.

The guidelines also recommended that morphine become the drug of choice for pain relief.

"We can do more and better to control pain after surgery," Health and Human Services Secretary Louis Sullivan said at a news conference to release the recommendations. "We need to plan ahead for pain control."

The guidelines, released by the department's Agency for Health Care Policy and Research, were the result of two years' work by a panel of pain-management experts. The recommendations will be widely distributed to physicians, nurses, medical and nursing societies, medical and nursing schools, insurers, consumer groups and others. - Los Angeles Times

by CNB