Any recommendations for easing the pain when injecting octreotide?

Posted:: 12 May 2011 by rosyp
Topics:: pain, cancer, octreotide

Details:

I am part of a team of nurses who are helping our friend undergoing cancer treatments who gets octreotide 3 times a day for 5 days, at intervals, The hardest part is how painful it is.

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Answers (2)

DzooBaby

12 May 2011

From what I read you should give the smallest volume to deliver the amount of drug you need. If it is given sub q, you might try using a cold/ice pack briefly to the area of injection just prior to injecting to reduce sensitivity of the area. Just be careful not to freeze burn the area of course. See if that helps any. Rotate injection sites of course. Poor patient! Nothing worse than the treatment being almost as bad as the illness!

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Delila

12 May 2011

Hi, you could also try pinching the injection site for about 20 seconds prior to the injection, otherwise you could use a topical anaesthetic cream, the name of one is Emla cream.

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