LOCUS OF CONTROL ORIENTATION AND LEVEL - Drake University

Epidurd analgesia involves placement of a small catheter into the
interspace at the level of intended analgesia or according to physician
Preference. This procedure is performed under asepsis by the anesthesiologist.
The catheter is then either connected to a continuous infusion or capped off for
access for bolus administration of narcotic analgesia. The most commonly us&
narcotics include morphine, fentanyl, and rneperidine (McNair, 1990). The
epidural analgesia is said to interact with receptors at each of the levels of the
nervous system to interfere with pain perception.
Lucus of Control as it Relates to Pain Perception
The relationship between LOC and pain perception has been
investigated. The focus of a majority of these studies has been the chronic pain
experience. A study of control as a variable to predict a response to chronic
pain has been a popular topic for scientific inquiry. A common observation of
sufferers of chronic pain is that these individuals are prone to depression. Some
researchers have tried to associate attributiond style with this predisposition to
depression. One popular hypothesis used to characterize or classify the person
with chronic pain was the "revised learned helplessness theory." This theory
predicted that persons who perceive events to be beyond their control and
traditionally explain negative events as internal, stable and global and positive
events as external, unstable and specific are prone to depression (Abramson,
Seligman & Teasdale, 1978). Although studies have supported SOme merit for
this explanation, others find the connection too weak to draw predictive
conclusions using this theory (Love, 1988).