Trends in pain undertreatment among lung cancer patients at the EOL: Analysis of urban city medical insurance data in China

Abstract Background Cancer‐related pain is one of the common priority symptoms in advanced lung cancer patients at the end‐of‐life (EOL). Alleviating pain is undoubtedly a critical component of palliative care in lung cancer. Our study was initiated to examined trends in opioid prescription‐level outcomes as potential indicators of undertreated pain in China. Methods This study used data on 1330 patients diagnosed with lung cancer of urban city medical insurance in China who died between 2014 and 2017. Opioid prescription‐level outcomes were determined by annual trends of the proportion of patients filling an opioid prescription, the total dose of opioids filled by decedents, and morphine milligram equivalents per day (MMED) at the EOL (defined as the 60 days before death). We further analyzed monthly changes in the number of opioid prescriptions filled, MMED, and mean daily dose of opioids per prescription (MDDP) of the last 60 days of life by year at death and age, respectively. Results A total of 959 patients with exact dates of death were included, with 432 cases (45.06%; 95% CI: 44.36%–45.77%) receiving at least one opioid prescription at the EOL. The declining trends were shown in the proportion of patients filling any opioid prescription, the total dose of opioids filled by decedents and MMED, with an annual decrease of 0.341% (p = 0.01), 104.23 mg (p = 0.011) and 2.84 mg (p = 0.014), respectively. Within the 31–60 days to the 0–30 days of life, the MMED declined 6.08 mg (95% CI: −7.14 to −5.03; p = 0.000351), while the number of opioid prescriptions rose 0.66 (95% CI: 0.160–1.16; p = 0.025). Like the MMED, the MDDP fell 4.11 mg (95% CI: −5.86 to −2.37; p = 0.005) within the last month before death compared to the previous month. Conclusion Terminal lung cancer populations in urban China have experienced reduced access to opioids at the EOL. The clinicians did not prescribe a satisfactory dose of opioids per prescription, while the patients suffered increasing pain in the last 30 days of life. Sufficient opioid analgesic administration should be advocated for lung cancer patients during the EOL period.