Burn Trauma: An Emerging Model for Acute Pain

Major advances have improved management of acute pain globally, but more than 50% of patients still have severe to intolerable pain after surgery or trauma (http:// www.efic.org/eap.htm). Emphasis in acute pain studies has shifted to outcomes that go beyond “good pain relief” to reductions in the risk of developing chronic pain, acute medical conditions, and the development of psychological disturbances due to pain. In addition, practice in acute pain medicine now extends well beyond the management of post-operative pain and has advanced in numerous clinical situations including trauma, spinal cord injury, back pain, and more recently, burn pain. However, there is relatively little direction on the appropriate design and conduct of pain experienced in burn patients. This review will summarise design-important issues in burn pain management studies with an emphasis on the challenges in burn pain clinical trials.