From taking this course I have found that pain in children is under-recognised because of the various myths that abound and that young children/ babies cannot verbalise to us that they are in pain. That is why the pain assessment tools such as NIPS and FLACC are so useful in non-verbal children. Undertreatment therefore follows and is compounded by our fear of possible complications. It is also useful to ascertain what type of pain it is.
In practice, it is imperative to assess pain (as the 5th vital sign) and to treat and reassess if there’s a response.
Furthermore, apart from physical pain, it is imperative to assess the child holistically and look for causes of pain in other domains eg psychological, social, cultural
