Anaesthesia | Pain | Step II: Appropriate Clinical Use of Weak Opioid/Paracetamol Combinations

Step II: Appropriate Clinical Use of Weak Opioid/Paracetamol Combinations
Session Overview
Description
This session will provide a rationale for the prescription of analgesia for patients with moderate acute pain.

Learning Objectives
By the end of this session you will be able to:

• Give examples of clinical conditions causing mild to moderate pain
• Compare the use of fixed and variable drug combinations
• List the choice of weak opioid and paracetamol combinations
• Recognize which patient groups require altered doses or avoidance of paracetamol
• Identify the adverse effects of different options
• Describe the efficacy of paracetamol-codeine combinations

Prerequisites
Before commencing this session you should have a basic knowledge of:

• The anatomy and basic neurophysiology of the Nociceptive Pathways
• Assessment of pain severity
• Pharmacological treatments – including paracetamol and opioids
• The World Health Organization (WHO) pain ladder
• The concept of multimodal analgesia and its components