The acute pain service (APS): How we should have done it.

‘Doctors think they deal with pain well. That this is a delusionary idea is well documented but still not accepted by most physicians. Since beliefs are not subject to normal rules of scientific persuasion, simple explanation of the self-evident does not alter medical practice; only social pressure or consumer demand seem effective. The first has driven the development of terminal care and the second has altered obstetric analgesia. Attention has now turned to postoperative pain’ (1).