TY - JOUR
T1 - Procedural education for cancer-related pain in Pain Medicine fellowships
T2 - A national program survey
AU - Woodrow, Alex
AU - Teramoto, Masaru
AU - Thapliyal, Mrinal
AU - Christiansen, Sandy
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© American Society of Regional Anesthesia & Pain Medicine 2023. No commercial re-use. See rights and permissions. Published by BMJ.
PY - 2023
Y1 - 2023
N2 - Introduction: Cancer-related pain is ubiquitous. Targeted procedural interventions may be an important and underutilized method for improving cancer-related pain and quality of life. The goal of this study was to determine the baseline educational experience and perceived post-graduation comfort of Pain Medicine fellows in performing procedures that can be used for cancer-related pain. Methods: Using Qualtrics, a 16-question survey was distributed to graduating fellows at accredited Pain Medicine Fellowship programs in the USA in June 2022. The fellows' experience and comfort level performing eight procedures was analyzed using summary descriptive statistics and contingency table analysis with statistical significance determined by Pearson's χ2 test. Results: Survey respondents represented 30% of fellows among 44% of Pain Medicine programs during the 2021-2022 academic year. The majority of respondents reported no experience performing 7 of the 8 procedures for cancer-related pain (56.1%-90.6%). Graduating fellows reported overall comfort performing sympathetic neurolysis (65.7%), spinal cord stimulator trials (85.7%) and implantations (66.0%), but not intrathecal pump trials (36.9%) and implantations (31.3%), peripheral nerve stimulator implantations (41.7%), vertebral augmentations (31.3%), and vertebral body radiofrequency ablations (16.7%). Conclusions: Experience performing 10 or more of the surveyed procedures, personal interest in treating cancer-related pain, and attendance of cancer-related pain lectures were found to significantly increase comfortability in performing cancer-related pain procedures post graduation, whereas cadaver-based learning did not. This study highlights the need for more robust procedural education for cancer-related pain and identifies procedural experience in non-cancer patients and lectures on cancer-related pain as ways to bridge this educational gap.
AB - Introduction: Cancer-related pain is ubiquitous. Targeted procedural interventions may be an important and underutilized method for improving cancer-related pain and quality of life. The goal of this study was to determine the baseline educational experience and perceived post-graduation comfort of Pain Medicine fellows in performing procedures that can be used for cancer-related pain. Methods: Using Qualtrics, a 16-question survey was distributed to graduating fellows at accredited Pain Medicine Fellowship programs in the USA in June 2022. The fellows' experience and comfort level performing eight procedures was analyzed using summary descriptive statistics and contingency table analysis with statistical significance determined by Pearson's χ2 test. Results: Survey respondents represented 30% of fellows among 44% of Pain Medicine programs during the 2021-2022 academic year. The majority of respondents reported no experience performing 7 of the 8 procedures for cancer-related pain (56.1%-90.6%). Graduating fellows reported overall comfort performing sympathetic neurolysis (65.7%), spinal cord stimulator trials (85.7%) and implantations (66.0%), but not intrathecal pump trials (36.9%) and implantations (31.3%), peripheral nerve stimulator implantations (41.7%), vertebral augmentations (31.3%), and vertebral body radiofrequency ablations (16.7%). Conclusions: Experience performing 10 or more of the surveyed procedures, personal interest in treating cancer-related pain, and attendance of cancer-related pain lectures were found to significantly increase comfortability in performing cancer-related pain procedures post graduation, whereas cadaver-based learning did not. This study highlights the need for more robust procedural education for cancer-related pain and identifies procedural experience in non-cancer patients and lectures on cancer-related pain as ways to bridge this educational gap.
KW - Cancer Pain
KW - EDUCATION
KW - Pain Management
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U2 - 10.1136/rapm-2023-104630
DO - 10.1136/rapm-2023-104630
M3 - Article
C2 - 37652574
AN - SCOPUS:85171169324
SN - 1098-7339
JO - Regional anesthesia and pain medicine
JF - Regional anesthesia and pain medicine
M1 - rapm-2023-104630
ER -