Abstract

Pain in patients with cancer has significant biological differences with the pain of other diseases and the use of analgesics for these patients is ineffective. Evaluation of the efficacy of oxycodone on the reduction of cancer pain according to the personality type. This is a pilot study with a one-group pretest- posttest design. The number of samples was considered 30 patients based on inclusion and exclusion criteria. Purposefully, Samples were selected from patients with moderate to severe Numeric pain Rating Scale (NRS) >= 6 chronic pain and referred to hospitals and oncology clinics. After the administration of the initial dose of oxycodone, the pain levels were measured at appropriate intervals, and the dose increased until reaching NRS <= 3. Characteristic data, the dosage of the drug, and pain levels were included in the pre-designed form. Personality type data collected with Friedman et al. Personality Briefcase questionnaire. The severity of pain in patients in the first month (day 30) was significantly lower than the basal pain; and in the second month (day 60) compared to baseline and first month (day 30 treatment), significant effect seen (p< 0.05 and 0.01). Also 80 of patients have personality type A and 20 personality type B. however, drug therapy is more effective for patients with B-type personality. The personality type of patients as a moderating variable affects the efficacy of the treatment. So it is recommended that oncology specialists, along with drug therapies, get help from psychologists to take psychotherapy according to the types of personality patients have.