CUES PARENTS USE TO ASSESS POSTOPERATIVE PAIN IN THEIR CHILDREN

Objective: Very little is known about the cues parents use to assess p ain in their children. This study has described the cues (verbal and n onverbal) parents reported using to determine how their children felt following surgery. Design and Subjects: The subjects were 176 parents of children undergoing short-stay or day surgery. Using pain diaries, parents were asked to provide written responses to the question ''Did your child give you any clues on how they were feeling?'' for the day of surgery and 2 days after their children's surgery. Parents also pro vided ratings of their children's pain five times per day using a visu al analogue scale. Setting: The study was conducted at a tertiary care children's hospital. Results and Conclusions: Parents frequently cite d using verbal report and appetite as cues to how their children were feeling. A variety of other cue types were also reported by parents, i ncluding activity level, sleep quality, visible/audible discomfort, an d physiological observations. Cue types were not significantly related to the child's gender, and only one cue type was significantly relate d to the child's age (appetite was used more often for older children than younger children). The presence or absence of illness behavior cu es (e.g., protective behavior, visible/audible discomfort) as well as disruptions to normal behavior pattern cues (e.g., sleep, level of act ivity) was related, in the expected direction, to the pain intensity r atings. This study provides insights into the cues parents use to asse ss pain in their children and serves as a foundation for future studie s on parents' assessment of children's pain.