Acute and chronic pain is common in older adults and often negatively impacts physical function, independence and quality of life. Normal age related changes, accumulated chronic conditions and polypharmacy complicate management by decreasing the benefit to risk ratio of most medications used for pain. In fact, pain management guidelines for older adults exist to assist clinicians in providing and recommending individualized safe and efficacious therapies. However, despite thorough guidelines and efficacious therapies, many older adults still struggle with pain. This is in part due to healthcare barriers that individual clinicians cannot easily address because they exist at the socio-cultural, organizational and structural level. Factors such as gender, race/ethnicity, poverty, substance use, stigma, incarceration, housing instability, social isolation and more impact the pain experience of older adults but are in general understudied.
The goals of this special edition are to 1) highlight the health disparities that impact the management of pain, 2) discuss the impact of pain on and potential unique healthcare barriers of different older adult populations with complex needs, 3) explore potential mechanisms of known health disparities that impact pain and identify mediators and moderators, 4) report novel interventions to managing pain in older adults with complex needs, 5) identify key stakeholders and successful implementation strategies in the provision of effective pain management programs, and 6) amplify the lived experiences of older adult populations with complex needs.
Acute and chronic pain is common in older adults and often negatively impacts physical function, independence and quality of life. Normal age related changes, accumulated chronic conditions and polypharmacy complicate management by decreasing the benefit to risk ratio of most medications used for pain. In fact, pain management guidelines for older adults exist to assist clinicians in providing and recommending individualized safe and efficacious therapies. However, despite thorough guidelines and efficacious therapies, many older adults still struggle with pain. This is in part due to healthcare barriers that individual clinicians cannot easily address because they exist at the socio-cultural, organizational and structural level. Factors such as gender, race/ethnicity, poverty, substance use, stigma, incarceration, housing instability, social isolation and more impact the pain experience of older adults but are in general understudied.
The goals of this special edition are to 1) highlight the health disparities that impact the management of pain, 2) discuss the impact of pain on and potential unique healthcare barriers of different older adult populations with complex needs, 3) explore potential mechanisms of known health disparities that impact pain and identify mediators and moderators, 4) report novel interventions to managing pain in older adults with complex needs, 5) identify key stakeholders and successful implementation strategies in the provision of effective pain management programs, and 6) amplify the lived experiences of older adult populations with complex needs.