Medicine:SOCRATES (pain assessment)
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Short description: Mnemonic acronym for pain evaluation
SOCRATES is a mnemonic acronym used by emergency medical services, physicians, nurses, and other health professionals to evaluate the nature of pain that a patient is experiencing.
Uses
SOCRATES is used to gain an insight into the patient's condition, and to allow the health care provider to develop a plan for dealing with it.[1][2] It can be useful for differentiating between nociceptive pain and neuropathic pain.[3]
Adverse effects
SOCRATES only focuses on the physical effects of pain, and ignores the social and emotional effects of pain.[4]
Procedure
| Letter | Aspect | Example Questions |
|---|---|---|
| S | Site | Where is the pain? Or the maximal site of the pain. |
| O | Onset | When did the pain start, and was it sudden or gradual? Include also whether it is progressive or regressive. |
| C | Character | What is the pain like? An ache? Stabbing? |
| R | Radiation | Does the pain radiate anywhere? |
| A | Associations | Any other signs or symptoms associated with the pain? |
| T | Time course | Does the pain follow any pattern? |
| E | Exacerbating / relieving factors | Does anything change the pain? |
| S | Severity | How bad is the pain? |
History
SOCRATES is often poorly used by health care providers.[5] Although pain assessments usually cover many or most of the aspects, they rarely included all 8 aspects.[5]
See also
- History of presenting complaint
- Medical history
- OPQRST
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Clayton, Holly A.; Reschak, Gary L. C.; Gaynor, Sandra E.; Creamer, Julie L. (December 2000). "A novel program to assess and manage pain" (in English). Medsurg Nursing 9 (6): 318-312. https://search.proquest.com/openview/46bb9ac56bf80bac2dc895b8cd307e57/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=30764.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Swift, Amelia (1 October 2015). "The importance of assessing pain in adults." (in English). Nursing Times 111 (41): 12-17. PMID 26647478. https://europepmc.org/article/med/26647478.
- ↑ Schofield, Marcia; Shetty, Ashish; Spencer, Michael; Munglani, Rajesh (May 2014). "Pain Managment [sic]: Part 1" (in English). British Journal of Family Medicine 2 (3). https://www.bjfm.co.uk/pain-managment-part-1.
- ↑ Gregory, Julie (2019-08-31). "Use of pain scales and observational pain assessment tools in hospital settings" (in en). Nursing Standard 34 (9): 70–74. doi:10.7748/ns.2019.e11308. ISSN 0029-6570. https://journals.rcni.com/doi/10.7748/ns.2019.e11308.
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 Manna, Aditya; Sarkar, S. K.; Khanra, L. K. (2015-04-01). "PA1 An internal audit into the adequacy of pain assessment in a hospice setting" (in en). BMJ Supportive & Palliative Care 5 (Suppl 1): A19–A20. doi:10.1136/bmjspcare-2015-000906.61. ISSN 2045-435X. PMID 25960483. https://spcare.bmj.com/content/5/Suppl_1/A19.3.
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