Researchers from the Polytechnic of Viseu in a study that calls for increased effectiveness in pre-hospital care

Daily

Study, published in the scientific journal “International Emergency Nursing”, observed, over 14 months between 2019 and 2020, 605 trauma victims, mostly men, aged between 18 and 96 years old

Carla Henriques, Ana Matos and Madalena Cunha, from the Polytechnic Institute of Viseu, are part of a group of researchers who concluded that trauma victims who present fear, anxiety or cold experience more pain. For this reason, they decided to issue an alert about the need to create more effective interventions in pre-hospital care.

Speaking to the Lusa agency, Mauro Mota, researcher at the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Porto and the Center for Research in Technologies and Health Services (CINTESIS), considered that “trying to effectively treat pain, ignoring the other entities responsible for discomfort, It’s not effective.”

“Pre-hospital assistance is an intervention that, between on-site assistance and transport to the emergency room, takes around an hour. It may seem that the period can be neglected because the objective is to get to the emergency room quickly, but we think not, that this period cannot be neglected in terms of sources of discomfort. These are moments of enormous suffering for the victims and it is up to us to work through these moments,” she said.

Mauro Mota, together with other researchers from FMUP and CINTESIS, both in Porto, and from other institutions in the country, signed a study, published in November, which shows that around 90% of the victims observed reported some degree of pain resulting from the injuries suffered.

Of this figure, 47.1% reported severe pain, 39% complained of discomfort caused by the cold, 49.8% showed anxiety and 15.7% showed signs of fear.

Over the course of 14 months between 2019 and 2020, 605 trauma victims were observed, mostly men, aged between 18 and 96 years.

Victims who were under the influence of alcohol or drugs or who had an altered state of consciousness were excluded.

Traffic accidents and falls were the main reasons for injuries: 40.7% and 37%, respectively.

According to a summary sent to Lusa by FMUP, immobilization revealed to be “a determinant clearly associated with higher levels of pain among victims”.

In total, 78.3% of victims had to be immobilized, an intervention aimed at reducing movements, protecting anatomical structures and minimizing the risk of new injuries.

The objective of the study was to evaluate the relationship between pain intensity and discomfort caused by other types of suffering, physical and psychological, in patients considered critical.

“To a certain extent, these data are surprising, but, more than that, they generate a very important warning about the need to increase the effectiveness of interventions in pre-hospital care”, summarized Mauro Mota.

To Lusa, the nurse with experience in pre-hospital care who is developing a post-doctoral study at FMUP on the immobilization of victims and discomfort, intending to create his own scale for this purpose, considered that “in the future, specific interventions for each of the entities causing suffering”.

“Culturally, when we question, in a clinical context, a patient about their comfort, we tend to confuse global comfort with the level of pain that the person perceives to have (…). We tend to think that the high levels of pain that are reported are due to the fact that we are only treating the pain, which is insufficient. We must treat all sources of discomfort and then we will have more effective results in treating pain. We are treating something that is not just pain as if it were just pain,” he explained.

In addition to Mauro Mota, this study published in the scientific journal “International Emergency Nursing” in November last year, has as authors the researcher Margarida Reis Santos, from CINTESIS/Escola Superior de Enfermagem do Porto, and other researchers from other institutions in the country, namely Filipe Melo (Center for Active Aging), Mariana Monteiro (Santa Casa da Misericórdia de Seia), Miguel Castelo-Branco (University of Beira Interior), Carla Henriques, Ana Matos and Madalena Cunha (Polytechnic Institute of Viseu).