Pain assessment from Swedish nurses' perspective

Abstract

Methods: This study is a qualitative interview study. The authors used the stimulated recall interview (SRI) with nurses working at a children's hospital in southern Sweden for the data collection. In total twelve nurses were interviewed and qualitative content analysis was used for the data analysis. Results:The results are presented as one theme: Need for higher competencies and evidence, and three categories: Routines can enable pain assessment, Trusting one's own assessment of the whole picture, and Pain assessment scales as an extra workload. The interviewed nurses acknowledged that pain assessment tools are a vital part of the field of pain treatment. They also had trust issues with measuring and estimating pain by means of a tool such as pain scale. Furthermore, their opinion was that too many different tools and methods add up towards a more blurry and stress-related environment and due to a lack of consistent routines, pain assessment is seen as a work-related burden in the daily routines. Conclusion:Results from the present study indicated that nurses need clear routines in combination with continued education regarding pain assessment with pain scales, which might be the key to successful pediatric pain assessment and thus to better pain management within pediatrics.

Pain management in hospitalized children: A cross-sectional study

“…Even with the use of validated scales, pain assessment is subjective, health professionals observe behavioral and physiological aspects and their judgment on a given variable indicates the score ( 10 , 16 ) , and in the case of the numerical verbal scale, considered the gold standard, the pain complaint may not be valued ( 13 ) . An American study illustrates the above, in which 48.2% of 178 users assessed reported severe pain, but only 15% of professionals documented this score ( 7 ) .…”

“…The hospitalized child is exposed to stressful experiences, either due to disease symptoms, and/or invasive and/or painful procedures carried out as part of the treatment routine ( 9 , 10 ) . In a European investigation, of 579 children evaluated, 87% had pain complaints in one day in the hospital ( 8 ) , but despite pain being frequent in this population, its management is inadequate and children continually experience unrelieved pain ( 11 , 12 ) .…”