Important terms
Pain terms
Breakthrough pain: An intense flare or spike of pain that breaks through well-controlled persistent pain. There are specific medicines to control breakthrough pain.
Chronic pain: Pain that lasts for more than 3 months. Chronic pain often has two parts: breakthrough pain and persistent pain. You may suffer from breakthrough pain in addition to chronic pain.
Persistent pain (constant or around-the-clock pain): Pain that lasts all day long. It does not spike like breakthrough pain. Your doctor might also call this pain background pain, or baseline pain.
Treatment terms
Addiction: Characterized by one or more of the following — impaired control over drug use, compulsive use, continued use despite harm, and craving of a medicine. Addiction usually does not occur when you take medicine under your doctor's supervision.
Around-the-clock pain medicine: Medicine that works for 8 hours or more. This will also be called long-acting or sustained-release medicine. Around-the-clock opioid pain medicine is used to treat persistent pain.
Breakthrough pain medicine: Rapid onset opioids or other short-acting opioid pain medicines are used to treat flares of breakthrough pain. Rapid onset opioids or short-acting or normal-release pain medicines are common treatments for breakthrough pain.
Buccal cavity: The area between the cheek and gum. A buccal tablet is designed to be placed in the buccal cavity, where it dissolves.
Constipation: Difficult or hard bowel movements. Constipation is unlikely to go away without treatment. Constipation is a common side effect of taking opioids.
Opioid: Medicine that's part of a class of strong painkillers. Opioids do not take the cause of pain away, they interfere with and stop pain messages from being sent to the brain to change the feeling of pain. Opioids require a prescription from your doctor. Examples of opioids are morphine, fentanyl, oxycodone, and codeine.
Pseudoaddiction: Drug-seeking behavior that appears similar to addiction but is due to a need for more medication to control pain rather than psychological dependence on a drug.
Physical dependence: When your body has gotten used to having the drug in your system. If you suddenly stopped, you would feel sick. This is called withdrawal syndrome. If opioids are used for a long period of time, it is expected that you will become physically dependent on your medicine.
Rapid onset opioid (ROO): A kind of short-acting opioid medicine that may start working in about 15 minutes and usually works for 1 hour.
Short-acting pain medicine: A kind of medicine that usually is a tablet that you swallow and starts working in about 30 to 40 minutes and usually works for about 2 to 6 hours.
Tolerance: When the body gets used to the medicine and its effects. It may mean a stronger amount of medicine is needed to maintain pain relief. It can also be when the body gets used to some of the side effects, such as nausea. This means that over time you will not feel these side effects or the side effects will be less bothersome to you. Tolerance is NOT addiction.