Postoperative pain characteristics in Turkish orthopedic patients.

Postoperative pain is a subjective concept that can only be defined by the individual experiencing it. This research was planned as a descriptive study to make postoperative pain assessments of patients who have undergone major orthopedic surgery. The study sample consisted of 150 patients who met the inclusion criteria and agreed to participate in the study. Data were collected using a questionnaire form that included sociodemographic, postoperative pain characteristics, and the McGill Pain Questionnaire. The data obtained were assessed using the SPSS 10.0 program. The mean age of the patients was 54.13 +/- 18.12 years, 67.3% were female, 72.7% of the patients had a history of previous surgery, 43.3% had had hip prosthesis surgery, and 70.7% when their analgesic medications were taken on PRN basis. They experienced "external" pain at the surgical site and in pressure areas according to type of surgery and verbalized their pain at the highest percentages as "throbbing," "tiring," "troublesome," and "nagging." In addition the majority of the patients (95.3%) stated that their pain was decreased with analgesic medication administration, and 78.7% stated that position change and physical therapy (69.3%) increased their pain. In the assessment of pain severity on the third postoperative day, the Present Pain Intensity was determined to be a mean of 1.75 +/- 1.02 (on a scale of 0 to 5), and 78.7% had "intermittent" pain. In addition, worst/severe pain severity was determined to be a mean of 4.55 +/- 0.70 on the third postoperative day. Statistically significant differences were found between patients' pain severity scores (p <or= .001). This study determined pain characteristics on the third postoperative day in Turkish orthopedic patients. After an evaluation of the conclusions, nurses must learn the postoperative pain characteristics of orthopedic patients to implement safe and effective postoperative pain management.