Holistic pain assessment in older people and older people living with dementia

Pain occurs in a wide range of diseases and long-term conditions associated with ageing and can affect every aspect of an individual’s life, reducing their ability to recover, their independence and their quality of life.

The assessment of pain is an important aspect of nurses’ role and requires them to obtain detailed information on how the older person experiences pain and how pain is affecting their life. However, there are many challenges to effective pain assessment in older people, including challenges concerning communication and cognition.

This article provides an overview of pain assessment in older people, particularly those living with dementia, based on the author’s expertise and on relevant literature, notably the recently revised UK national guidelines on the assessment of pain in older people.