Prevalence of pain-related presentations in Canadian pediatric emergency departments.

Objective: Pain is a common reason for attendance to the emergency department; however, pediatric specific data on the prevalence, location, and etiology of painful presentations are limited in the literature. Therefore, the objective of this study was to determine the prevalence of pain-related presentations to pediatric emergency departments during the triage process and characterize the anatomical locations and organ systems most affected by pain in a modern cohort.

Methods: A two-center health record review of triage documentation was conducted at Canadian pediatric emergency departments. All children (< 18 years) were eligible for inclusion. Data were extracted from administrative sources with one week of consecutive patients included every 3 months over a one-year timeframe. Regression analyses were completed to identify variables associated with painful presentations and analgesia provision during the triage process.

Results: A total of 7208 emergency department presentations were included. Median [IQR] child age was 5.2 [1.9, 11.8] years and 53.2% were male. 58.8% of children were found to have pain as a component of their triage presentation. Of those with pain (n = 4237), 24.1% had a pain score documented and 13.8% had analgesia provided at triage. Location of pain (n = 4523) was predominantly in the head (38.0%), extremities (27.8%), and abdomen (22.8%). Primary organ systems most affected (n = 4237) included the musculoskeletal (31.1%), gastrointestinal (18.3%), and cutaneous (including lacerations) (14.4%) systems.

Conclusions: In this study, pain was identified in almost 60% of all pediatric emergency department presentations at the time of triage. Suboptimal documentation of pain scores and provision of analgesia at triage were found for children with pain. These results support early assessment and implementation of pain management strategies at triage. Results can also focus further research efforts to the management of the most commonly presenting types of pediatric pain.