Apples for Health- More being done to reduce infant pain

More being done to reduce infant pain

MELBOURNE, July 17 (UPI) -- Doctors are finding ways to reduce the agony for infants undergoing painful procedures such as heel lances to draw blood, Australian researchers said.
Studies have shown poorly managed pain in infants can have immediate and long-term physiological and behavioral effects, Australian researchers wrote in the Journal of Pain.
As a result, pediatric researchers have recommended reducing the number of painful procedures routinely administered, giving oral sucrose before and during minor painful procedures, and using pre-emptive opioid analgesia before endotracheal intubation.
The researchers reviewed more than 3,600 minor procedures performed on 55 infants. Of those, 7 in 10 were heel lances in which analgesics were infrequently used or not at all, the researchers found.