LAUSR

In 2001, Visentin et al. published the results from a single-center survey on basic knowledge and attitudes of physicians and nurses toward pain, conducted in an Italian hospital. Based on the percentage of correct answers (from 30% to 96%), they concluded that there were significant knowledge deficits and erroneous beliefs that might hamper treatment of the patient in pain and that these results would help in designing educational programs aimed at improving pain treatment [1]. In 2002, during the 4th Italian National Congress of Medical Oncology, we administered the same questionnaire to 100 residents in oncology. The median overall percentage of correct answers was 89%, which varied from 35% to 97% among the different items: 75.4% for items regarding the use of analgesics, 87.2% for items regarding attention to pain, and 73.3% for items regarding pain in children. In our opinion, these results indicated that the knowledge and attitudes about treatment of pain among residents in oncology might be considered adequate [2]. Educational programs on core competencies in the assessment and management of cancer pain have likely driven an improvement in the last years. Moreover, the Italian legislation now also protects patients’ rights by setting “measures to guarantee the access to palliative and pain treatments” (Law 38/ 2010) [3]. Nevertheless, we still observed barriers and limitations in pain-related knowledge and practice among the oncology community.