Pain Management, Therapy, and Wound Care Practice Flashcards

Vocabulary-style flashcards based on lecture notes covering pain responses, therapeutic heat and cold applications, wound types, and the staging of pressure injuries.

Acute Pain

Pain with a recent onset that goes away with healing, often accompanied by the Fight Flight Response.

Chronic Pain

Pain with an onset longer than $6$ months, characterized by few or no physiological signs and potential psychological impacts like low self-esteem.

Diaphoresis

A sign that acute pain is worsening, characterized by profuse sweating.

Syncope

Fainting that can occur as acute pain becomes more severe.

Lassitude

A behavioral sign of chronic pain characterized by physical or mental weariness.

TENS

Transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation; a battery powered device that massages an area by closing the gate and stimulating production of epinephrine.

The Gate Theory

The theory that the hypothalamus acts as a gate keeper for pain; the gate must be open to receive pain, and increased stress causes the gate to open.

Nocireceptors

Receptors related to the transmission of pain, involving Substance P and Prostiglands.

Substance P

A substance that elicits localized tissue reactions.

Prostiglands

A hormone in the immediate area that causes pain.

Heat Therapy

Local application of heat causing vasodilation, which increases the flow of oxygenated and nutrient-rich blood to tissues.

Vasodilation

The widening of blood vessels and pores in capillary walls becoming more permeable during heat therapy.

Cold Therapy

The application of cold to cause vasoconstriction, slowing metabolism and decreasing tissue oxygen demand.

Vasoconstriction

The constriction of vessels and reduction of capillary permeability during cold therapy.

Hemostasis

The control or stopping of bleeding, which is an indication for cold therapy.

Tepid baths

A method of cold application used for indications such as fever.

Closed wound

A wound in which the skin remains intact, such as a contusion.

Open wound

A wound in which the skin integrity has been breached.

Contusions

A closed, discolored wound from blunt trauma (bruise) where blood leaks from broken vessels into interstitial spaces.

Abrasions

Superficial open wounds such as scrapes or scratches.

Penetrating

An open wound from a sharp item where the object is still in the skin.

Lacerations

An open wound resulting from the cutting or tearing of tissue.

Clean-contaminated

A surgical wound that is not infected but has direct contact with normal flora in the respiratory, urinary, or GI tract.

Contaminated

A wound contaminated by asepsis, such as a surgical or trauma wound.

Perulent

A characteristic of an infected wound consisting of pus.

Narcrotic

A term for dead tissue present in an infected wound.

Erythema

Redness of the skin, which is a sign of infection or pressure.

Colonized

A wound with higher numbers of infection but showing no clinical signs of infection.

Shearing

A force that occurs when a patient moves in the opposite direction than the item they are moving on.

Stage $1$ Pressure Injury

Erythema of intact skin that does not blanch.

Stage $2$ Pressure Injury

Partial-thickness skin loss with an exposed dermis.

Stage $3$ Pressure Injury

Full-thickness loss involving damage to the epidermis, dermis, and subcutaneous tissue but not muscle or bone.

Stage $4$ Pressure Injury

Full-thickness skin and tissue loss involving deep tissue necrosis of muscle, fascia, tendon, joint capsule, or bone.

Unstageable Pressure Injury

Full-thickness tissue loss that cannot be accurately staged because the wound bed is obscured by eschar or slough.

Deep tissue pressure injury

Intact or non-intact skin that is deep red, maroon, or purple and does not blanch, or a blood-filled blister overlying a dark wound bed.

Eschar

Dead tissue that can be found under blisters and may obscure the depth of a pressure injury.

Slough

Excessive dead tissue in the wound bed that makes accurate staging of a pressure injury impossible.