RESEARCH LETTER Pain and analgesics on admission to the internal medicine ward 1 Douleur Neuropathique 4, 4 supplemented with a questionnaire regarding pain exacerbations de‑ signed by the authors. e Numeric Rating Scale (NRS; range, 0–10) was applied to rate the pain intensity. e Edmonton Symptom Assessment System adapted to the Verbal Rating Scales was used to evaluate other symptoms. 5 Pharmacother‑ apy of pain and nonpharmacologic pain therapies were recorded. Information regarding the physi‑ cians responsible for pain treatment, consulta‑ tions with specialists in pain management, use of prescription and over‑the‑counter (OTC) drugs, and knowledge about pain as well as the imple‑ mented therapy was also collected. e efficacy of prehospital pain treatment was assessed based on the decrease in pain intensity, using 4 ranges: less than 25%, 25% to 49%, 50% to 74%, and 75% to 100%. Pain intensity reduction on the NRS by at least 50% was defined as a substantial improve‑ ment in pain control. 6 Appropriate pain therapy was predefined according to product characteris‑ tics and pain management recommendations, in‑ cluding: 1) correct formulations, routes of admin‑ istration, and doses, 2) use of coanalgesics and adjuvants preventing the adverse effects of an‑ algesics, and 3) avoidance of coadministration of drugs with antagonizing clinical effects (eg, spas‑ molytics with prokinetics) or medications that raise the risk of significant DDIs or drug‑disease interactions. 7 DDIs were assessed according to the Lexicomp Drug Interactions Checker. 7 DDIs grad‑ ed as moderate and major were determined, and the following recommendations were analyzed: C (monitor therapy), D (consider therapy modifica‑ tion), and X (avoid combination). Approval of the Bioethical Committee of the Poznan University of Medical Sciences Introduction Pain is one of the most common symptoms in hospitalized patients. Among the in‑ dividuals admitted to internal medicine wards (IMWs), its prevalence may exceed 60%. 1-3 Nu‑ merous patients experience pain for months be‑ fore hospitalization; however, they are frequent‑ ly not provided with adequate pain treatment. 3 IMW patients comprise a complex population of mostly elderly individuals with chronic comor‑ bidities, frequent multiple organ failure, poor cognitive status, and common polypharmacy; therefore, they are vulnerable to adverse drug reactions. e use of analgesics raises the risk of potentially serious adverse effects, some of which may have a negative impact on the course of chronic diseases. Despite the high prevalence of pain in hospi‑ talized patients, both undertreatment and inad‑ equate therapy are significant health issues. Re‑ search on these topics remains scarce. e aim of this study was to evaluate pain characteristics as well as the effectiveness and safety of phar‑ macotherapy for pain among patients admitted to the IMW. We also sought to analyze the most common errors and risk of drug‑drug interactions (DDIs) as well as drug‑disease interactions asso‑ ciated with pain treatment. Patients and methods We assessed 280 individ‑ uals consecutively admitted to the IMW of the H. Cegielski Medical Centre in Poznań, Poland be‑ tween May 2019 and October 2020, and attend‑ ed to by the first author (AS). Only the patients who reported pain on admission (n = 111 [39.6%]) were included in further analysis. On admission, pain was evaluated using the Pol‑ ish versions of the Brief Pain Inventory and RESEARCH LETTER Pain treatment and risk associated with the use of analgesics on admission to the internal medicine ward: a prospective observational study Aleksandra Sesiuk 1 , Aleksandra Kotlińska‑Lemieszek 2 ,3 , Tomasz Grądalski 4,5 1 Medix Non‑Public Health Care Center, Poznań, Poland 2 Department of Palliative Medicine, Pharmacotherapy in Palliative Care Laboratory, Poznan University of Medical Sciences, Poznań, Poland 3 University Clinical Hospital, Poznań, Poland 4 Department of Palliative Medicine, Andrzej Frycz Modrzewski Krakow University, Kraków, Poland 5 St. Lazarus Hospice, Kraków, Poland Correspondence to: Aleksandra Kotlińska‑Lemieszek, MD, PhD, Department of Palliative Medicine, Pharmacotherapy in Palliative Care Laboratory, Poznan University of Medical Sciences, Os. Rusa 55, 61‑245 Poznań, Poland, phone +48 61 873 83 03, email: alemieszek@ump.edu.pl Received: August 4, 2023. Revision accepted: October 3, 2023. Published online: October 5, 2023. Pol Arch Intern Med. 2023; 133 (11): 16579 doi:10.20452/pamw.16579 Copyright by the Author(s), 2023