Rectal Cancer Pain Management

Managing Rectal Cancer Pain

Rectal cancer patients may experience some pain during the course of the disease, especially those who are in more advanced stages of cancer. At Cancer Treatment Centers of America (CTCA), we are committed to restoring quality of life and making your treatment for rectal cancer as bearable as possible. In doing so, we provide a variety of complementary medicine treatments, such as cancer pain management.

Cancer pain may be classified as acute or chronic. Acute pain usually lasts for a limited about of time and can be successfully managed once the cause of pain is identified. Chronic pain, on the other hand, usually lasts for more than three months and the cause often cannot be altered.

Causes

Rectal cancer affects each patient differently. The severity and prevalence of pain you may experience depends on factors such as age, personality, perception, pain threshold (tolerance for pain), past experiences with pain, and more. Cancer-related pain can result from the disease process itself and/or from rectal cancer treatment methods such as surgery, radiation therapy, and/or chemotherapy. Psychological factors such as fear, insomnia, fatigue, and anxiety may lower the pain threshold, while rest, sleep and diversion can raise pain thresholds and improve quality of life.

Upon your arrival at CTCA, you will have an initial evaluation by one of our pain management practitioners. Part of this evaluation will involve an assessment of your rectal cancer pain. An accurate assessment of your pain experience provides a basis for various pain management techniques.

Assessment

Before placing you in a pain management program, CTCA pain management practitioners will first perform a comprehensive assessment of your pain experience that examines the following dimensions of your pain:

• Location
• Intensity
• Factors influencing its occurrence (i.e., what makes it better or worse)
• Observed behaviors during pain
• Psychosocial variables (e.g., attitudes, situational factors)
• Effects of therapy and patterns of coping

Pain Management Plan

At CTCA, our ultimate goal is to provide relief from pain and to help you restore and maintain your normal quality of life. Since each person experiences rectal cancer differently, we manage cancer pain on an individual basis. We will work closely with you to develop a personal pain management plan that is part of your overall rectal cancer treatment plan. The pain management methods we use in rectal cancer treatment attempt to either control the cause of pain, or alter your perception of it.

Pain Management Methods

Therapeutic approaches to pain management can be classified as either pharmacological or non-pharmacological. Pharmacological approaches to rectal cancer pain involve the use of analgesics and other medications that intensify the analgesics' effects, or modify your mood or pain perception.

Non-pharmacological pain control methods may include:

• Radiation
• Surgery
• Neurological and neurosurgical interventions
• Traditional nursing and psychosocial interventions
• Acupuncture
• Relaxation techniques and guided imagery training
• Massage and physical therapy

Because of the unique way that each rectal cancer patient responds to pain, successful pain management usually requires a combination of techniques that are patient-specific.

Additional Rectal Cancer Information

• Detection
• Treatments
• Staging
• Metastatic
• Pain Management
• Alternative Treaments

Next Topic: Alternative Rectal Cancer Treatments