Parent application of eutectic mixture of local anaesthetics seemed to be as effective as clinician application for reducing children's pain and distress during intravenous insertion
QUESTION: Is parent application of eutectic mixture of local anaesthetics (EMLA) as effective as clinician application for reducing children's pain and behavioural distress during intravenous (IV) insertion?
Design
Randomised (unclear allocation concealment), blinded (clinician) trial.
Setting
An outpatient gastrointestinal (GI) clinic in the US.
Patients
41 children of 2 age groups (younger group 5–12 y, mean age 9 y and older group 13–18 y, mean age 15 y) who were scheduled for elective outpatient GI endoscopy with IV sedation. Children were excluded if they could not understand the visual analogue scale (VAS). Follow up was 88%.
Intervention
After stratification by age group, children were allocated to parent (n=11 in the younger group, n=10 in the older group) or clinician (n=10 in both the younger and older groups) application of EMLA (2.5 g to the back of both …
