How can we monitor palliative care? Suggestions from the Latin American Association for Palliative Care

摘要

Access to pain treatment and to palliative care services is limited even in developed countries, as a result of a lack of political will, insufficient education, and overly restrictive regulations on the use of opioid medications. Many national health programmes and strategies for life-threatening conditions such as cancer and HIV do not have provisions to ensure access to palliative care and to pain treatment. The developing countries, which are home to about 80% of the global population, account for only 6% of worldwide morphine consumption (International Narcotics Control Board, 2010), resulting in tens of millions of people suffering with moderate to severe pain, including 5.5 million patients with advanced cancer and 1 million patients with HIV (World Health Organization (WHO), 2011).