Background:

The knowledge of the prevalence of postoperative pain allows to develop effective programs to achieve the optimal "hospital without pain".

Objective:

Identify, in a prospective cohort study, the prevalence of postoperative pain in consecutive inpatients.

Material and methods:

Patients over 18 years undergoing surgery of any specialty, identifying pain in the first 48 hours. Verbal numerical rating scale (VNRS) was used to measure pain intensity; we also evaluated the number of painful events, established treatment, mean time of pain relief and distribution by specialty.

Results:

80 patients with mean age of 42 ± 16.4 years; 50% corresponding to each gender. One or more pain events were documented in 37.5% of patients; 83.3% showed a single event. Average pain intensity in VNRS was 5.7 ± 2.6 and pain duration was 16.5 ± 4.5 minutes; 70% of patients presented pain in the first two hours. Drugs used: ketorolac in 50% of cases and opioids alone in 20.83%. The specialties with the highest percentage of pain were plastic surgery (75%) and general surgery (50%).

Conclusions:

The prevalence of postoperative pain is high during the first two hours; close monitoring of pain and its early control are important for the welfare of the patient.