Neonatal and Infant Pain Assessment and Management

Abstract

Studies have shown that babies experience pain as early as 20 weeks of fetal age. During hospital stays, neonates and infants are exposed to many painful and stressful procedures, such as heel lancing, vaccination, mucous suctioning, venipuncturing, lumbar puncturing and peripheral IV insertion. Because neonate’s and infants’s pain is usually assessed based on behavior and physiological changes, it is critical that the pediatric nurses recognizes the signs of pain. This qualitative literature review comprises articles that are no more than 10 years old, published at peer-reviewed scientific journal and deal with the assessment of pain in babies using pain scales and pain management from a non-pharmacological perspective. For the study, articles from electronic databases such as PubMed, Sage Journals, and EBSCO were retrieved. Data were analyzed using deductive content analysis. This literature review concluded that different pain scales can be used to measure the intensity of pain in neonates and infants. Assessment is based on behavioural and physiological changes during and after painful procedures. Some of the scales have proven to be reliable, but more precise scales will be required in the future. Non-pharmacological pain management methods are frequently utilized and chosen to treat baby’s pain due to their low side effects and high risk-benefit ratio. Breastfeeding and glucose solution are the most effective pain management methods, according to studies.