Non-pharmacological analgesia during the heel lance procedure in newborns. Application in other painful procedures

Introduction: neonatal screening is one of the first painful stimuli in newborns. It consists in the extraction of a capillary blood sample by puncturing the heel. Neonatal pain is often underestimated and also the need to apply analgesia in these cases has not always been taken into account.

Patients and methods: an experimental study was conducted on a sample of 106 newborns in the San Pedro Hospital in Logroño during 2018. Depending on the analgesia received during the heal lance, the population sample was divided into three groups. Pain response was evaluated using a validated scale.

Results: pain was significantly higher in the non-intervention group compared to the groups treated with glucose or breastfeeding (p <0.001). However, no statistically significant differences were found between both the analgesic procedures (p = 0.851).

Conclusions: we propose the implementation of these interventions in other painful procedures. Health professionals must be aware of the perception of pain in the procedures carried out in Hospitals or Primary Care Centers.