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Cancer pain is a common symptom in patients with cancer and can largely affect their quality of life. Pain management is important to minimize the impact of pain on daily activities. Cancer nurses are significantly involved in all steps of pain management and contribute to the success of therapy through their knowledge and expertise. While they generally play an important role in the screening, assessment, diagnosis, treatment and follow-up of patients and their (pain) symptoms, this varies from country to country in Europe. An important aspect is their role in educating patients and their families about what pain is, what impact it can have, how it can be treated pharmacologically or non-pharmacologically and what effects or problems can occur during treatment. While there is a great discrepancy between education and training opportunities for cancer nurses in different European countries, there is a continued need for education and training in pain management. Cancer is increasingly becoming a chronic disease, and the management of pain in cancer survivors will be crucial to maintain an adequate quality of life. With this, the crucial role of cancer nurses is becoming even more important., Competing Interests: JdM is a steering committee member and lecturer for the Mundipharma Pain Academy and an advisory board lead for Viatris. RdM is an employer of Mundipharma Pharmaceuticals B.V. At initiation of this work, FAdJ was employed by Mundipharma. WHO is a steering committee member and lecturer for the Mundipharma Pain Academy. ND, AK, STP and HU declare no conflicts of interest. The funders (Mundipharma Research Limited) had no role in the design of the study; in the collection, analyses or interpretation of data; in the writing of the manuscript or in the decision to publish the results., (© The Author(s), 2023.)

Background: Patients with advanced cancer are increasingly expected to self-manage. Thus far, this topic has received little systematic attention., Aim: To summarise studies describing self-management strategies of patients with advanced cancer and associated experiences and personal characteristics. Also, to summarise attitudes of relatives and healthcare professionals towards patient self-management., Design: A systematic review including non-experimental quantitative and qualitative studies. Data were analysed using critical interpretive synthesis. Included studies were appraised on methodological quality and quality of reporting., Data Sources: MEDLINE, Embase, Cochrane Central, PsycINFO, CINAHL, Web of Science and Google Scholar (until 11 June 2019)., Results: Of 1742 identified articles, 31 moderate-quality articles describing 8 quantitative and 23 qualitative studies were included. Patients with advanced cancer used self-management strategies in seven domains: medicine and pharmacology, lifestyle, mental health, social support, knowledge and information, navigation and coordination and medical decision-making (29 articles). Strategies were highly individual, sometimes ambivalent and dependent on social interactions. Older patients and patients with more depressive symptoms and lower levels of physical functioning, education and self-efficacy might have more difficulties with certain self-management strategies (six articles). Healthcare professionals perceived self-management as desirable and achievable if based on sufficient skills and knowledge and solid patient-professional partnerships (three articles)., Conclusion: Self-management of patients with advanced cancer is highly personal and multifaceted. Strategies may be substitutional, additional or even conflicting compared to care provided by healthcare professionals. Self-management support can benefit from an individualised approach embedded in solid partnerships with relatives and healthcare professionals.

Background: Healthcare professionals and researchers in the field of palliative care often have difficulties finding relevant articles in online databases. Standardized search filters may help improve the efficiency and quality of such searches, but prior developed filters showed only moderate performance., Aim: To develop and validate a specific search filter and a sensitive search filter for the field of palliative care., Design: We used a novel, objective method for search filter development. First, we created a gold standard set. This set was split into three groups: term identification, filter development, and filter validation set. After creating the filters in PubMed, we translated the filters into search filters for Ovid MEDLINE, Embase, CINAHL, PsychINFO, and Cochrane Library. We calculated specificity, sensitivity and precision of both filters., Results: The specific filter had a specificity of 97.4%, a sensitivity of 93.7%, and a precision of 45%. The sensitive filter had a sensitivity of 99.6%, a specificity of 92.5%, and a precision of 5%., Conclusion: Our search filters can support literature searches in the field of palliative care. Our specific filter retrieves 93.7% of relevant articles, while 45% of the retrieved articles are relevant. This filter can be used to find answers to questions when time is limited. Our sensitive filter finds 99.6% of all relevant articles and may, for instance, help conducting systematic reviews. Both filters perform better than prior developed search filters in the field of palliative care.

Background: For patients with cancer-related pain, the numeric rating scale is the most frequently used instrument to measure pain intensity. In the literature, it has been suggested to interpret patient-reported ratings of pain in relation to the pain intensity which is acceptable to the individual patient., Aim: We aimed to examine the feasibility and course of acceptable pain intensity., Design: A secondary analysis of a randomized controlled trial that tested the effectiveness of standard care versus standard care supplemented by a pain consultation combined with a patient pain education program., Setting: A total of 72 patients were included from an outpatient oncology clinic of a university hospital. They were diagnosed with cancer-related nociceptive pain with an average pain intensity ⩾4., Results: Most patients (97%) were able to give a score for acceptable pain. Almost half of the patients scored their acceptable pain in the range of moderate to severe. Patients' ratings of acceptable pain were stable; after 8 weeks, 69% of patients had a variation of up to 1 point compared to baseline. However, the mean acceptable pain intensity remained equal in the standard care group (from 4.6 (range: 0-8) to 5.0 (range: 2-8)) and decreased in the intervention group (from 4.6 (range: 2-8) to 3.8 (range: 0-7, p < 0.01), difference between groups p < 0.05)., Conclusion: Measurement of acceptable pain intensity is feasible. Patients with additional pain treatment became more critical and accepted less pain. More research is needed before we can use acceptable pain intensity as a reference for the interpretation of pain ratings.