pain assesment essays

pain assesment essays Running head: PAIN ASSESSMENT IN YOUNG CHILDREN The Wisconsin Childrens Hospital Pain Scale for Preverbal Children: A Descriptive Study Experiences of Nurses Using the University of Wisconsin Childrens Hospital Pain Scale for Preverbal Children: A Descriptive Study Most patients in the hospital setting experience pain. Pain is a subjective phenomenon that varies from person to person. The most relied upon indicator of pain is a patients verbal report of the pain, but what happens when the patient cannot verbalize his pain? This is the case with infants and other nonverbal patients. They experience pain but are unable to tell a nurse where it hurts, how it hurts, and the intensity to which it hurts. OConner-Von (2000) stated "if self-report is not available, physiologic or behavioral measures must be used" (p. 1), and "nurses are the key health care personnel responsible for continuous assessment in children in the health care setting" (p. 1). Nurses need a reliable and continuous means of pain assessment for the preverbal population. A study of the pediatric pain practices of national health professionals showed that only twenty percent of the sample used a behavioral assessment scale (Broome, Richtsmeier, Maikler, s report as to whether or not the patient was in pain. While this method of pain assessment can be accurate, it can also vary widely between nurses as no two nurses have the same perception or as...