Table 1 Key points for analgesia within an ERP for colorectal surgery

• Analgesia is a key component in enhanced recovery pathways.

• Optimal analgesia addresses patient pain while restoring function and minimizing side effects.

• Minimizing opioid use and its side effects is a cornerstone of analgesia practice within ERPs.

• Intraoperative opioid-sparing techniques and postoperative early oral multimodal analgesia are the backbone for providing analgesia within ERPs.

• Open, laparoscopic, and robotic surgical approaches need different analgesic strategies.

• There are many different analgesic combinations that are efficacious.

• Hospitals should adopt at least two or three analgesic strategies for colorectal surgery to allow for individual patient variation or failure of the primary choice of analgesia.

• Hospitals should have a troubleshooting pathway in place for breakthrough pain to minimize the negative impact of intravenous opioid use.

• Audit of compliance of analgesia and restoration of function can lead to improvement of patient experience.