Pain Management in Patients with Peripheral Arterial Disease

Introduction-Aim: A chronic disease with increasing frequency, peripheral arterial disease occurs due to atherosclerosis. Fontaine and Rutherford classifications are common staging methods in peripheral arterial disease. Resting pain caused by ischemia (Fontaine 3-4) adversely affect the patient's life and their treatment is as important as the treatment of the disease. Accurate assessment of pain also provides the right approach. The Visual Analogue Scale and verbal descriptive pain scale are among the various scales used in pain measurement. We aim to contribute to the literature by evaluating our patients who were treated with pain due to peripheral arterial disease in our hospital. Materials and Methods: Patients with peripheral arterial disease who were treated for pain between January 2014 and September 2018 were investigated retrospectively. Those with resting pain due to ischemia (Fontaine stage 3-4) were included in the study, while Fontaine stage 1-2 patients without pain were excluded. The data were obtained from the patient files and hospital registry. Results: The mean age of the 15 patients who had pain treatment for peripheral arterial disease was 69.13 ± 8.11 years. The patients included 7 females and 8 males. Six stage 3 and nine stage 4 patients were identified based on Fontaine classification. According to the verbal descriptive pain scale, 5 had mild, 7 had moderate and 3 had severe pain. One patient underwent epidural catheter placement for administration of patient-controlled analgesia while 14 patients received pharmacological treatment. Conclusion: Accurate assessment is important for appropriate pain treatment in peripheral arterial disease. Communication with the patient is important in this regard. Risks that may occur in the treatment of pain should be undertaken with a multidisciplinary approach.