Need help w/ cultural/spiritual considerations

[2bJoshRN9788]

Any ideas for considerations of pain management of a 75 year old Jewish American? I have tried searching online for pain management considerations for this population, but have not been too successful. Any help would be appreciated.

[dudette10, MSN, RN]

I think it would depend upon the particular "denomination" of the Jewish patient. Is he/she Hasidic, orthodox, conservative, or reformed? The movement that patient belongs to usually dictates the person's practice, and I think it would make a big difference in nursing care, rather than the patient's description as just "Jewish."

Start with the denomination, look at the common practices of the denomination, then determine if it impacts pain management interventions. It may be that the cultural considerations would not impact interventions at all. If you had a chance to talk to your patient, he/she may prefer pain management interventions that aren't at all influenced by religious persuastion. I had one Catholic patient that used cinnamon to help control diabetes. While she was not averse to the usual meds to help control her glucose, she insisted on taking her cinnamon, too, and the doctor allowed it.

While it's important to understand the doctrine of the patient's denomination, it's usually more important to talk to the patient to determine his/her own practices. For example, many, many Catholic patients use birth control and IVF for reproduction, although both are forbidden by Catholic doctrine.

[anon695]

As the other poster said, it all depends on the individual patient, but overall I've never known a Jewish person to have any objections to pain medication. They don't have an official religious ban on meds (unless it's a pork product in some way, and even then you'd have to ask them because some are fine with that). Also, they're usually very open when it comes to discussing their pain or any other medical issues.

[Aberdeen]

Do a search for Mark Zborowski, People in Pain. He did some research dealing with cultural influences to pain back in the 50’s or 60’s. If I remember correctly older Jewish men tend to be more emotional and vocal when it comes to pain…or is it they exaggerate their pain…or maybe it’s both…I can’t remember, lol