Palliative care: the nurses' contributions in pain assessment

The purpose of this study is to reveal nurses' ideas and contributions on the assessment of cancer patients' pain in palliative care through a proposal of work education based on Paul Freire's problematizing education theory. We used Juan Charles Maguerez's "problematization arc" as a strategy for data collection. The study included six nurses. The results pointed to three categories: (1) the meaning of pain, (2) the way pain assessment is practiced by nurses and (3) contributions to care. Cancer pain is a total pain. It exceeds the physical dimension of disease and extends to psychological and social dimensions. The deployment of systematic pain care routines, enclosed in the systematization of nursing care makes it possible to better redirect the actions, therefore achieving a most complete and effective pain management.