A Conceptual Framework for Understanding Patient Expectations in Individualised Anaesthesia and Analgesia: A Narrative Review and Future Directions
Acute postoperative pain remains a major clinical challenge, affecting both recovery and resource utilisation. Beyond nociceptive input, pain is shaped by cognitive and emotional factors, including patient expectations. This narrative review examines the role of expectations in perioperative pain modulation, framed within predictive coding and Bayesian inference models. These models conceptualise
