An holistic approach to wound pain in patients with chronic wounds

For many years, there has been a push to increase the focus on treating the patient as a whole person, not just his or her medical condition-often referred to as "holistic care." In recent years, there has been an increasing awareness of the amount of pain patients with chronic wounds experience while living with unresolved wounds. Quite understandably, much of the initial interest in pain in these patients has focused on pain at dressing change. However, clinicians must remember to place this pain experience within a full wound and pain assessment, to allow patients and clinicians to work together to resolve pain issues within the context of the whole pain experience, and thus to focus on the whole person, not just the wound.