Characteristics of Pain and How it is Interpreted and Assessed

Biology
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Biology
Part I: Compare and contrast how pain is interpreted by children and adults.
Children and adults experience differently. First, it is crucial to note that both children and adults experience pain. Pancekauskaite and Jankauskaite (2018) warn that at times, the beliefs and values of parents can become a hindrance to pain management in children. For example, the misconception that children do not feel pain happens to influence the actions of many parents. However, like adults, children do feel pain.
However, the perception of pain between adults and children differs greatly. It is possible for children to have their understanding of pain influenced by their environment or other emotional and psychological factors which is not the case for adults (Pancekauskaite and Jankauskaite, 2018). For children, factors such as distress and fear can misinform and lead to the wrongful interpretation of pain in children.
It is crucial to note that children’s interpretation of pain is greatly impacted by their age, communication skills, cognitive skills, and their developmental level (Srouji, Ratnapalan, and Schneeweiss, 2010). These greatly influence how a child perceives pain. Children who are approaching 10 years happen to have a much-developed interpretation of pain and its effect on them. Children and adults also have fully developed nociceptors. Nociceptors are sensory receptors that detect threats to tissues or damage to tissues. However, the difference is in the interpretation because as Pancekauskaite and Jankauskaite (2018) indicate, “junctions between nociceptive neurons and the ones in the spinal cord do not function the same.”
Part II: Describe the characteristics of pain.
Pain is assessed through several characteristics. These include intensity, quality, alleviating and aggravating factors, personal meaning, location, timing, and pain behaviors.
The intensity of pain simply means the magnitude of pain or the pain range which could be described as excruciating or mild. The intensity of pain is greatly determined by how much pain a person can handle or tolerate.
The quality of pain mainly entails how the pain is described by a patient. The quality of pain is often described after a person visits a healthcare center, and is asked to share their feeling or to provide a description of the pain they are feeling.
Alleviating and aggravating factors are the aspects or conditions that make the pain worse or lessens it. While assessing the pain, nurses can ask patients this question as they try to assess how to treat a wound or whichever sickness a person has.
Personal meaning, as a characteristic of pain, denotes the aspect of pain having a particular meaning to a person. The meaning is different from what other people perceive.
Location is a characteristic of pain that entails or means the part of the body that is said to be in pain. It is simply the area of a body that is in pain.
Timing as a characteristic of pain denotes the changes or the patterns that develop as a result of pain. For example, is there a relationship between the intensity of pain and when the pain starts? Or when is the pain most severe?
Pain behaviors are the many expr...