Sensorial saturation: An effective analgesic tool for heel-prick in preterm infants

Pain is traumatic for preterm infants and can damage their CNS. We wanted t o assess whether multisensorial stimulation can be analgesic and whether th is effect is only due to oral glucose or sucking. We performed a randomized prospective study, using a validated acute pain rating scale to assess pai n during heel-prick combined with five different procedures: (A) control, ( B) 10% oral glucose plus sucking, (C) sensorial saturation (SS), (D) oral w ater, and (E) 10% oral glucose. SS is a multisensorial stimulation consisti ng of delicate tactile, vestibular, gustative, olfactory, auditory and visu al stimuli. Controls did not receive any analgesia. We studied 85 heel-pric ks (5 per baby) performed for routine blood samples in 17 preterm infants ( 28-35 weeks of gestational age). We applied in random order in each patient the five procedures described above and scored pain. SS and sucking plus o ral glucose have the greater analgesic effect with respect to no interventi on (p < 0.001). The effect of SS is statistically better than that of gluco se plus sucking (p < 0.01). SS promotes interaction between nurse and infan t and is a simple effective form of analgesia for the NICU. Copyright (C) 2 001 S. Karger AG, Basel.