Resumen
Opioid switching is the practice of substituting one opioid for another to improve pain relief or reduce adverse effects. This study aimed to examine pain and adverse event outcomes in people with advanced cancer pain, comparing those who undergo opioid switching with a control group, using multidimensional pain and standardized adverse event recording to add toward the limited data on this common practice. We found that compared to the control group, opioid switching reduced pain (worst, average, now) (p < 0.05), uncontrolled breakthrough pain (a 3-fold reduction, p = 0.008), and psychological distress (48% to 16%, p < 0.005). This study demonstrates that opioid switching is effective at reducing pain, adverse effects, and psychological distress to satisfactory levels of symptom control within 1 week in a population with advanced cancer pain. The use of multidimensional tools and standardized reporting further adds to the quality of evidence supporting opioid switching practice.