One of the most common chief complaints that pediatric patients report in the emergency department is pain. The overall purpose of this systematic review, was to not only examine what type of nonpharmacological methods Emergency Departments’ (ED) are using to manage pain in pediatric patients, but also to examine the benefits of using these methods. After reviewing studies in the CINAHL, PubMed, and Cochrane databases, only fourteen articles met the criteria for this review. Records were excluded if the study was not conducted in the ED, if the study was conducted more than eighteen years ago, if they were not published in English, if the study included adults, and if the study only included pharmacological methods for pain management. Some examples of nonpharmacological interventions implemented to manage pain in children in the ED that were discussed in the article included music, guided imagery, breathing techniques, distractions, the application of hot and cold, massage, swaddling, suckling, temperature regulation, rocking, and transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation. Furthermore, the tools that were used to assess the effectiveness of nonpharmacologic pain management included pain assessment scales such as FLACC, FACES, the Oucher Scale, the Visual Analog Scale, and the Procedural Behavior Rating Scale. Results revealed that the nonpharmacological methods to reduce pain, not only assisted with pain, but also reduced stress and anxiety levels of both the child and the parent.
