• Lixia Zhu, ChanWai-Chi SallyWSSchool of Nursing and Midwifery, Faculty of Health and Medicine, The University of Newcastle, Callaghan, NSW, Australia., LiamJoanne Li WeeJLWDivision of Nursing, KK Women's and Children's Hospital, Singapore, Singapore., Chunxiang Xiao, Evelyn Chin Choo Lim, Nan Luo, ChengKin Fong KarisKFKNational University Health System, Singapore, Singapore.Alice Lee Centre for Nursing Studies, Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of Singapore, Singapore, Singapore., and Hong-Gu He.
• Department of Pharmacology, Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of Singapore, Singapore, Singapore.
• J Adv Nurs. 2018 Jul 1; 74 (7): 1517-1530.

AimTo examine the effects of a postoperative pain management educational intervention on the outcomes of parents and their children who underwent inpatient elective surgery.BackgroundEquipping parents with knowledge and skills to manage their children's postoperative pains is essential. Very limited studies have examined the effects of educational interventions on parents' knowledge, attitudes and use of pharmacological and non-pharmacological pain relief methods.DesignThree-group pre- and post-test randomized controlled trial.MethodsParent-child pairs (N = 152) were recruited from September 2013-January 2015 and randomly assigned to either the control group or one of the two intervention groups. Valid and reliable instruments and diary entries were used to collect data at the baseline, 6, 12 and 24 hr and 2 weeks after the surgery. IBM SPSS 23.0 was used to analyse the data.ResultsParents reported moderate levels of knowledge, attitudes, pain relief methods used and children's postoperative pain. Except for parents' knowledge, types and frequencies of non-pharmacological methods used, there were no statistically significant differences among the three groups in parents' attitudes on pain management and pain medication, their uses of pain relief strategies (questionnaire data), satisfaction with postoperative pain management and children's worst postoperative pain in 2 weeks after surgery.ConclusionEducation seemed effective in improving parents' knowledge and use of non-pharmacological methods, but not attitudes, satisfaction with pain management and children's postoperative pain. Future studies are needed to develop modern digitalized ways for educating and supporting parents to optimize their children's postoperative pain management.Trial RegistrationThis study has been registered with BioMed Central Ltd. (Registration No.: ISRCTN24910957).© 2018 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

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