Pediatric Vaccine Pain Management & Perceptions of Caregivers and Nursing Staff: An Evidence-Based Project

Background: In an age with many diseases controlled through immunization and herd immunity, the significance of immunization can wane in public memory. In children, injection pain is an obstacle to vaccination and can cause anxiety around medical visits, healthcare avoidance, delayed immunizations, and needle fear (McMurty et al., 2015; Shah & Sui, 2019; Taddio et al., 2022). Evidence-based vaccine pain relief techniques are described in the literature (Shah et al., 2009; Wu et al., 2022; Taddio et al., 2015), yet their use in practice is minimal (Taddio et al., 2022).

Local Problem: An evaluation of a pediatric clinic revealed nurses infrequently used pain management methods during immunization. This assessment indicated the need for education and the adoption of evidence-based vaccine pain management techniques. Project goals included educating staff on the effectiveness of evidence-based vaccine pain management and improving the caregiver's perception of the immunization procedure.

Methods: The nursing staff offered vaccine pain relief methods to all pediatric patients receiving immunizations; their caregivers and nurses then provided feedback on their perceptions of the techniques.

Interventions: Vaccine pain management methods included sucrose use (Stevens et al., 2018; Taddio et al., 2015), distraction (Bergomi et al., 2018; Canbulat et al., 2014), vaccine education, parental presence, physical positioning, and the most painful injection being given last (Taddio et al., 2015).

Results: Sixty-four parents and nine pediatric nurses completed post-intervention questionnaires. 60% of caregivers reported their child's vaccine experience was improved with vaccine pain management, while 100% of nursing staff found the vaccine pain management effective.

Conclusions: Based on these results, it is possible that pain management techniques improve the caregiver’s immunization experience. Pediatric providers, therefore, should encourage these effective and compassionate interventions to support timely immunization and overcome pain as a barrier to immunizations. Future projects should investigate vaccine pain management barriers and how to increase their use in practice.