Childhood pain: the school-aged child's viewpoint

Abstract

This interview study was designed to obtain a substantial body of information about childhood pain from a large cohort (n = 994) of Northern Californian school children between the ages of 5 and 12 years. The primary criteria for assignment to groups were extent of hospitalization experience, recency of hospitalization, presence of a painful chronic condition, and chronic iatrogenic pain. Open-ended questions were used to determine the extent of the children's knowledge and understanding of pain, their ability to describe pain, specific pain experiences, use of coping strategies, preferences concerning the timing of information about impending pain, and maladaptive pain usage. There was unequivocal evidence of the children's ability to communicate effectively concerning their pain, however, knowledge and understanding of pain for most of the sample was at a low developmental level, with no clearly defined age trends and no sex differences. There was relatively low use of coping strategies and the frequency of maladaptive pain usage was disquieting.