Inadequately managed pain can lead to adverse physical and psychological patient outcomes for individual patients and their families. It is of utmost importance to valuation, assessment and pain relief, presenting these as vital elements in contributing to the welfare and quality of life of the individual, and its control a person's right and duty of health professionals.

To understand how nurses cope with the pain phenomenon and its evaluation in the context of a continuing care unit.

This is a descriptive-exploratory study, with qualitative methodological approach. Data were collected based using semi-structured interviews, participant observation and documentary analysis of nursing records. The study included five nurses from a continuing care unit at the Santa Casa da Misericórdia Hospital, Tábua, Portugal. There were conducted 10 interviews, 25 participant observations and consult of 25 nursing records, over a period of 60 days.

The results obtained allow us to know the main problems of the nurse in the identification and characterization of the pain of the user taking into account their individuality, the performance of non-pharmacological and/or pharmacological taking into account the degree of pain and subsequently identified the election by each nurse the information recorded in the register of Nursing.

Education about safe pain management will help prevent undertreatment of pain and the resulting harmful effects. Safety includes the use of appropriate tools for assessing pain in cognitively intact adults and cognitively impaired adults. Otherwise pain may be unrecognized or underestimated.