Healthy and Cancer Children's choice of words to describe pain

• Author(s): Fernandes, Ananda Maria ; campos, diana catarina ; Batalha, Luís Manuel da Cunha ; gonçalves, ana maria pacheco mendes perdigão da costa
• Date: 2013
• Origin: Repositório Científico da Escola Superior de Enfermagem de Coimbra
• Subject(s): Children; Adolescents; Pain assessment; Cancer
• Document Type: Conference Object
• Language: Portuguese

Description

Pain perception is influenced by age and gender. As children grow, their ability to express and understand the pain experience changes. Illness experience may also play a role in children's choice of words to describe pain. Aim To compare the use of pain descriptors by children and adolescents of different age groups, gender and health condition. Methods As part of a larger study, 67 pain descriptors from Adolescent Pediatric Pain Tool were presented to two groups of children (8-12 years old) and adolescents (13-17 years old): healthy and diagnosed with cancer (n=48). In each group, 24 subjects were included: 6 boys and 6 girls. Following Q-sort procedure, children were asked to recall their pain experiences and allocate each descriptor to one of three categories: a) words that I know and use to describe pain; b) words that I know but don't use to describe pain; c) words that I don't know. For each subject, the percentage of words that were used within the number of words that were known was calculated and used as dependant variable in stepwise regression analysis. Results Cancer subjects use fewer words to describe their pain compared to healthy subjects. Although there were no age and gender related differences in whole group analysis, sub-analysis in the cancer group showed that adolescents (13-17 yo) and girls use more words to describe their pain. Health condition and age group were retained as predictors in regression analysis. Conclusions Illness experience seems to ply a role in the use of words to describe pain. Health professionals should also be aware of age and gender related differences in pain language to avoid underestimating the experience of less communicative groups.