Purpose of review: We discuss the challenges and strategies in delivering post-operative pain relief that is both standardized and individualized as appropriate. Post-operative pain remains under-treated and is frequently complicated by side effects. Guidelines for multimodal analgesia report varying strengths of evidence. Additionally, there are particular evidence gaps in establishing how individual and population subgroups responses vary, due to pharmacogenetic, metabolic, and psychological variation.
Recent findings: In cases where evidence is scarce or low quality, Standardized Clinical Assessment and Management Plans (SCAMPs) are an innovative method for healthcare practitioners to integrate available evidence resources and avoid unplanned variations in the quality of care delivered. Implementation of SCAMPs can be facilitated by the sheer volume of relevant information for drug prescribing and monitoring, drug-drug interactions, laboratory tests of organ function, drug metabolism and excretion data, electronic medical record data, and individual pharmacogenetic profile data. Standardization of care using algorithms or computer-assisted prescribing is emerging as a useful tool to raise compliance where guidance does exist. Individualizing care may require computational analysis of vast quantities of individual and population data to support or lead clinician decision-making. Such technology is used widely across diverse fields ranging from meteorology and commerce to agriculture and gene sequencing, but there are particular applications and challenges within medicine. To maximize benefit and reduce harm from post-operative analgesia, standardization and individualization, such as SCAMPs must be balanced and employed as appropriate.
Keywords: Bundled care; Electronic medical records; Enhanced Recovery After Surgery Society; Individualized; Multimodal; Post-operative analgesia; SCAMPs; Standardized; Standardized Clinical Assessment and Management Plans.