[Medical Q&A] What is a pain pump and will using it lead to dependence?

Planner: Chinese Medical Association

Reviewer: Lu Haiyang, deputy chief physician, Beijing Friendship Hospital, Capital Medical University

Analgesia pump is a device that can control the speed of drug infusion, mainly used for postoperative analgesia. It can keep the concentration of analgesics in the blood stable, helping to achieve better analgesic effect with less drugs. Analgesia pumps usually allow patients to press by themselves, adding additional infusion doses on the basis of continuous infusion volume. When the patient feels the pain worsens, he can press the self-controlled drug delivery button once by himself to add a certain amount of liquid medicine to increase the analgesic effect, making the treatment more individualized and suitable for different degrees of pain.

The scope of use of analgesia pumps includes patients who undergo a wide range of operations and a long duration, such as radical cancer surgery, combined surgery of the head, neck, chest and abdomen, and patients who undergo thoracotomy, laparotomy and long incisions. It is not only used for postoperative analgesia, but also for cancer pain, labor analgesia, etc.

As for adverse reactions, the use of analgesic pumps may cause some patients to experience nausea, vomiting and other reactions, but this is not a common phenomenon. Moreover, the use of analgesic pumps follows the principles of precision, multi-modality, and combined analgesia, and the drugs used are set according to the patient's condition and safe dosage. Therefore, standardized use is safe and controllable, and will not lead to dependence problems.

Overall, the pain pump is an effective pain management tool that can improve patient comfort and recovery.