To investigate the analgesic efficacy of preemptive analgesia in the perioperative period of transarterial chemoembolization (TACE) for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) patients.

36 cases of patients undergoing TACE from May 2023 to September 2023 admitted to the Department of Interventional Radiology at Jiangning Hospital were allocated into control group and received routine pain management and psychological intervention. From October 2023 to March 2024, 47 cases of patients undergoing TACE were managed with preemptive analgesia on the basis of the control group as the observation group. The Numeric Rating Scale (NRS) scores during surgery, at 6 h and 24 h after intervention, postoperative additional analgesic requirements, and perioperative comfort levels (Bruggrmann Comfort Scale, BCS) were compared between the two groups.

In the observation group the NRS score were lower than those of control group during surgery, at 6 h and 24 h after intervention (P<0.05). The proportion of patients requiring additional analgesics within 24 h postoperatively was 29.8% in the observation group, significantly lower than that of the control group (77.8%). The BCS scores of the observation group were higher than those of the control group during surgery and at 6 h postoperatively (P<0.05), while no significant difference was observed at 24 h postoperatively (P>0.05).

Preemptive analgesia effectively reduces pain intensity in patients undergoing TACE, decreases postoperative analgesic consumption, and enhances comfort during the early perioperative period. Therefore, preemptive analgesia is worthy of clinical promotion and application.