{"id":2483,"date":"2025-09-10T13:30:21","date_gmt":"2025-09-10T03:30:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/grandrounds\/?p=2483"},"modified":"2025-10-07T10:53:00","modified_gmt":"2025-10-06T23:53:00","slug":"the-comfort-promise-we-do-everything-possible-to-prevent-and-treat-pain-for-every-child-every-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/grandrounds\/2025\/09\/10\/the-comfort-promise-we-do-everything-possible-to-prevent-and-treat-pain-for-every-child-every-time\/","title":{"rendered":"The Comfort Promise: We do everything possible to prevent and treat pain. For Every Child. Every Time."},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/player.vimeo.com\/video\/1124730391?dnt=1&amp;app_id=122963\" width=\"1140\" height=\"641\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"autoplay; fullscreen; picture-in-picture; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><strong>Synopsis<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Data show that in both high-income and low-medium income countries, needle pain is consistently rated among\u00a0the\u00a0most painful and least well-managed\u00a0medical experiences for children. According to\u00a0the\u00a0U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, as many as\u00a02 in 3 children\u00a0and\u00a01 in 4 adults\u00a0suffer from a strong fear of needles. This fear, often rooted in negative experiences during childhood, leads to\u00a0healthcare avoidance behaviours\u00a0and is\u00a0the\u00a0leading reason for\u00a0immunisation non-compliance.<\/p>\n<p>Several initiatives have been successfully implemented to address this challenge, including\u00a0the\u00a0Comfort\u00a0Promise, a global program adopted in\u00a0more than 50 hospitals across 26 countries<\/p>\n<p>on all six continents. This presentation will:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Review data of procedures which cause to date\u00a0the\u00a0most untreated pain and anxiety among children<\/li>\n<li>Explore how untreated procedural pain in children results in higher morbidity and mortality.<\/li>\n<li>Discuss evidence-based modalities to prevent or ease procedural pain and anxiety which should be offered to every child, every time, everywhere.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Speaker<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Professor Stefan Friedrichsdorf<\/strong>\u00a0is a Professor of Paediatrics and\u00a0the\u00a0Chief of\u00a0the\u00a0Division of Paediatric Pain, Palliative and Integrative Medicine at\u00a0the\u00a0UCSF Benioff Children\u2019s Hospitals in San Francisco and Oakland. As\u00a0the\u00a0Medical Director of\u00a0the\u00a0Stad Center for Pediatric Pain, Palliative and Integrative Medicine he proudly leads one of\u00a0the\u00a0most comprehensive programs of its kind in\u00a0the\u00a0country, which received\u00a0the\u00a0prestigious ChildKind International pain relief certification and\u00a0the\u00a0Joint Commission Palliative Care Certification.<\/p>\n<p>Dr. Friedrichsdorf is\u00a0the\u00a0physician lead for\u00a0the\u00a0systemwide \u201cBenioff Children\u2019s Hospitals\u00a0Comfort\u00a0Promise: We\u00a0promise\u00a0to do everything possible to prevent and treat pain. For every child. Every time.\u201d aiming to reduce pain and anxiety caused by needle procedures. In 2024 he was recognized as a \u2018Leader\u2019 by Time Magazine in\u00a0the\u00a0\u201c100 most influential people in health\u201d edition.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Data show that in both high-income and low-medium income countries, needle pain is consistently rated among\u00a0the\u00a0most painful and least well-managed\u00a0medical experiences for children. According to\u00a0the\u00a0U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, as many as\u00a02 in 3 children\u00a0and\u00a01 in 4 adults\u00a0suffer from a strong fear of needles. This fear, often rooted in negative experiences during childhood, leads to\u00a0healthcare avoidance behaviours\u00a0and is\u00a0the\u00a0leading reason for\u00a0immunisation non-compliance.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6263,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7947,7930,7949],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2483","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-education-and-research","category-general-interest","category-paediatrics"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/grandrounds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2483","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/grandrounds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/grandrounds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/grandrounds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6263"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/grandrounds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2483"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/grandrounds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2483\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2484,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/grandrounds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2483\/revisions\/2484"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/grandrounds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2483"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/grandrounds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2483"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/grandrounds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2483"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}