INTRODUCTION

1. Role of Parent and Child Gender in the Treatment of Pre-School and Early School-Age Children’s Everyday Pain: “Suck it up” vs. Providing Comfort Jessica M. Joseph1, Ayala Y. Gorodzinsky1, Amy F. Sato1, Amy L. Drendel2, W. Hobart Davies1, 3 1University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee, 2Medical College of Wisconsin, and 3Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin INTRODUCTION RESULTS RESULTS (cont) • Exposure to painful experiences is common for children and understanding how caregivers respond to this pain is important for determining appropriate interventions for health care professionals. • Previous work has suggested that many parents may be reluctant to provide pain medication to their children due to their concerns and beliefs about the use of pain medication in children. • The current study examined how parent and child gender influences the decisions parents make about the use of medication and nonpharmacological methods for treating their child’s pain. • Frequencies of item response rates were initially calculated for the four questions of interest to determine what concerns and methods were the most commonly reported. Cramer’s phi coefficients were then calculated between parent gender, child gender, and the individual items to determine if question responses varied significantly by gender. • The majority of the item responses examined did not vary in their responses by parent or child gender. • Eight variables did show significant differences in response according to parent gender. Five were associated with which nonpharmacological methods parents used, one was associated with why parents decided not to give pain medications to their child, and two were associated with reasons that parents chose to give their child pain medications. • Both parents’ responses to the same four pain medication questions revealed three significant differences that varied by their child’s gender. • Mothers were more likely than fathers to give baths, rub/massage, provide comfort and use ice when their children were in pain. • Mothers were more likely than fathers to give pain medication when their children asked for it and when increased activity was planned for their child. • Mothers also reported being more likely than fathers to use alternative approaches to treat their child’s pain instead of using analgesics. • Fathers were more likely to tell their child to “suck it up” when the child expressed feelings of pain. • Parents are more likely to not give pain medications to daughters than sons because they think their daughter is not really in pain or they think the pain is stress related. • Parents also reported being more likely to use distraction as a coping strategy with their daughters than with their sons. METHODOLOGY • These data were collected as part of a larger study using a community sampling technique in which parents of children between the ages of two to six were recruited to complete an online survey. • Participants were asked to focus on their oldest child between the ages of two to six and 240 parents participated. • Participants were predominantly mothers (62%), Caucasian (89%), post high school educated, and had families consisting of multiple children. About half (52%) of the children in the sample were boys. • Parents’ responses to four questions were examined for this study from a section of eleven questions that pertained to pain experiences. These questions were developed from a qualitative examination of parents’ knowledge about pain medication use in an emergency room setting. CONCLUSIONS • A picture emerges of considerable similarity between mothers’ and fathers’ reports of how they view their child’s pain and how they help them cope with this pain. • These results support the previous literature and provide new insights by examining how community parents make decisions about analgesic use for their children. • Previous research has predominately used clinical samples; however, the current study’s findings were congruent with past literature suggesting the presence of some parent and child gender differences in how decisions are made about medication use for children. FUTURE DIRECTIONS • Future research should examine how parent and child demographic variables influence decisions about pain management across clinical and non-clinical populations so that parents’ beliefs and concerns can be targeted to inform decision-making for medication use. CONTACT INFORMATION Corresponding Author: Jessica M. Joseph, B.A. Email address: josephjm@uwm.edu Poster presented at the 2008 National Child Health Psychology Conference, Miami Beach, FL