Effectiveness of Distraction Versus Cutaneous Stimulation on Venipuncture Pain Response among Children

Introduction: Intravenous procedure is invariably painful for children. Non-pharmacological techniques such as distraction and cutaneous stimulation provide coping strategies that help to manage and reduce perception of pain and decrease anxiety without medications. Aim: To compare the effectiveness of passive distraction (group I) versus cutaneous stimulation (group II) on venipuncture pain response among children.

Materials and Method: A quantitative two group post-test only single centered study was conducted among 100 children, between the age group of 3 to 7 years attending a selected hospital and undergoing venipuncture at a given time. OUCHER Scale (Asian Version- Male and Female) was used to assess pain responseto compare the effectiveness of passive distraction and cutaneous stimulation aimed at decreasing pain by applying ice pack over the site of procedure. The comparison of effectiveness of interventions wascomputed by using independent‘t’ test.

Results: The result showed that the mean pain score of group I (passive distraction) and group II (cutaneous stimulation) was 4.68±2.66 and 3.48±2.16, which was statistically significant (p = 0.01). There was a significant association between selected clinical aspects of children like being afraid of coming to hospital, being hospitalized and fear of needles with the pain score at p< 0.05 among children received distraction technique, whereas there was no association between the selected clinical aspects of children with the pain score in group received cutaneous stimulation.

Conclusion: In the present study cutaneous stimulation was found more effective pain relieve strategy than passive distraction during venipuncture.Hence, all the health care professionals should use optimal nonpharmacological pain management techniques in all aspects of paediatric practice and improve children outcomes to an extent as possible while maintaining high quality health care.