[How children aged 7 to 11 explain their headache]
Rosana M R Mendonça1, Yára D Fragoso, Ricardo Diniz
1Faculdade de Medicina, UNIMES, Santos, SP, Brazil.
Insights
Children aged 7-11 can effectively describe their own headaches during medical interviews. Direct patient reporting provides reliable information for diagnosing childhood headaches.
Area of Science:
- Pediatrics
- Neurology
Context:
- Childhood headache diagnosis often relies on adult accounts.
- Direct patient interviews are crucial for accurate assessment.
Purpose:
- To evaluate the ability of children aged 7-11 to describe their headaches during anamnesis.
- To assess the reliability of self-reported headache characteristics in young patients.
Summary:
- Ninety-four children (7-11 years) underwent two individual assessments by a pediatrician, without adult presence.
- Children provided consistent and detailed headache information when given adequate time and allowed to use their own words.
- Direct patient reporting proved valuable and reliable, contrasting with typical adult-mediated consultations.
Impact:
- Highlights the importance of direct patient interviews for childhood headache evaluation.
- Suggests that empowering children to describe their symptoms leads to better diagnostic information.
- Informs clinical practice regarding pediatric headache assessment strategies.
Abstract:
The aim of the present study was to observe the ability of children aged 7 to 11 in describing their headache during anamnesis. For this purpose, two evaluations of 94 children were performed in individual assessments, done by the same Pediatrician, within a six to eight week interval, without the presence of adults. The characteristics of headache in these children could be properly evaluated during the interviews. There were no remarkable conflicting information between the two interviews. Although the headache of the child is usually described by the accompanying adult during the consultation, childhood headache should really be informed by the patient. In this group of young children (7 to 11 years old), information could be obtained without difficulty since we allowed the child enough time and the use of his (her) own words.
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