Assessing Pain in Children
Regular pain assessment is done to decide how bad the pain is, where it is, and the effect of pain relief.
Many children can tell staff about their pain themselves, and parents can often help too.
Assessing pain in a newborn baby and young child can be difficult. In the case of the smallest children a pain score is used based on different types of behaviour. Tools for measuring pain can be used depending on the child’s age and level of understanding. Here, a faces scale and number scale from 1 to 10 are commonly used.