Defining Refractory Pain in Cancer for Clinicians and Researchers

Managing pain in people with cancer remains a challenge, in those referred to as having refractory pain. But is refractory or intractable pain? Until there is a standard there is the risk that: a) clinically, new medications continuously added, each with diminishing returns reducing pain, and each with an increasing likelihood of as the only noticeable change; and b) in research, there be differing baselines for the operational definition of refractory, it difficult to adopt the findings into practice, to compare clinical trials in any systematic way.