Pain Dairy - Useful?

During the last three weeks of my mother's life, we definitely did the first two items. Providing pain medication at specific routine times is definitely a must. The hospice nurses always advised us that playing 'catchup' to pain was much harder than just taking a drug routinely and keeping it at bay. We also kept a pain diary listing when and how much of any drug we gave to our mother and what her pain level was. Hospice nurses would then later review the diary whenever they visited and adjust drug dosages or kinds accordingly. I would caution trying to draw a conclusion and taking action yourself based off of patterns. Drug interactions can be quite complex and although something may coincide with the start of a new drug, it may be a drug that they are already taking that needs adjusting and not the new drug. But it is definitely something to bring up with the doctor or hospice whenever you see them no matter how weird your theory might be. 

Thanks Ithenderson. We’ve started the pain diary, but my dad refuses to take the pain meds with regularity or frequency as he’s not wanting to spend his time in a semi comatose state when he’s not in unbearable pain all the time and it’s too sporadic to find a real pattern.

once we’ve a few days of this diary, we’ll discuss with the medical team to see if they can see any patterns in the pain / pain relief and adjust treatment accordingly. 

in the meantime, we’re embarking on a night time routine of meds to help him sleep through the night and it seems to be having an effect so far.