Abstract

  Background and Aim: Neonates have increased pain sensitivity in comparison to children and adults. Therefore, recognition and application of pain control strategies by health care workers are necessary. Immunization is one of the most common and painful events during infancy which is typically conducted without pain management. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of a distraction technique in reducing pain due to vaccination in infants.

  Materials and Methods: This study is a randomized controlled trial performed on healthy infants, who were brought to the health centers of Iran University of Medical Sciences in west of Tehran by their mother and had DPT immunization. 76 healthy infants were randomly assigned to experimental and control groups. During immunization, experimental group received a rattle as a distraction technique by the researcher 30 seconds before vaccination until 15 seconds after, while the control group received standard care in health centers. The modified behavioral pain scale (MBPS) was used to assess pain scores during baseline and after immunization. The data were expressed as the mean ± the standard deviation, and they were analyzed through independent t-test.

  Results: The results showed that the MBPS scores were significantly lower in distraction group (6±1.831) compared with those of the control group (8.53±1.059), (p=0.0001).

  Conclusion: This study showed that distraction technique was effective in reducing pain due to vaccination in infants. It is suggested to use this simple intervention during immunization injection in health centers.