Children's Pain at Home After Laparoscopic Appendectomy.

Background: Hospitalized children experience moderate-to-severe pain after laparoscopic appendectomy, but knowledge of children's pain experiences after discharge home is limited. Accurate pain assessments are needed to guide appropriate pain treatment.

Aims: To describe children's pain at home after laparoscopic appendectomy.

Design: Prospective exploratory and descriptive METHODS: A convenience sample of 100 patients, aged 10-17 years, who spoke or wrote in English or Spanish, volunteered to complete 14-day pain diaries at home after laparoscopic appendectomy. Visual analytic techniques were used to analyze patterns of pain experiences.

Results: Diaries were returned by 45 patients/parents, the majority of whom were White (64%), male (56%), adolescents (mean age 14 years) with no previous surgical history (70%), and whose appendix was inflamed (87%) but not perforated. More than 50% reported severe pain (4 or 5 on a 0-5 scale) on the first full day home after laparoscopic appendectomy. On day 7, 40% reported pain and on day 14, 16% were still reporting pain. Only rarely were pain scores not clinically significantly lower 1 hour after pain treatment, regardless of treatment type (e.g., nondrug, nonopioid, opioid). Reported pain intensity steadily decreased over time as did frequency of recorded pain scores.

Conclusion: Adolescents experience severe pain at home after laparoscopic appendectomy and some experience pain for 7 to 14 days after hospital discharge. Visual analytics better represent the dynamics of pain experiences than measures of central tendency.