Parents' pain medication underdosing is associated with more emergency department visits in sickle cell disease

To determine the association between health literacy, medication knowledge, and pain treatment skills with emergency department (ED) use of parents of children with sickle cell disease (SCD).

Parents of children 1- to 12-years-old with SCD were enrolled. Health literacy was assessed using the Newest Vital Sign. Parents completed a structured interview assessing knowledge of the dosage and frequency of home pain medications and an applied skills task requiring them to dose a prescribed pain medication. Underdosage was defined by too small a dose (dosage error) or too infrequent a dose (frequency error). The association between medication knowledge and applied skills with ED visits for pain over the past year was evaluated using Poisson regression adjusting for genotype.

One hundred parent/child pairs were included; 50% of parents had low health literacy. Low health literacy was associated with more underdose frequency errors (38% vs. 19%, P = 0.02) on the skills task. On medication knowledge, underdose dosage errors (adjusted incidence rate ratio [aIRR] 2.0, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.3-3.0) and underdose frequency errors (aIRR, 1.7, 95% CI 1.2-2.6) were associated with a higher rate of ED visits for pain. On the skills task, underdose dosage errors (aIRR 1.6, 95% CI 1.1-2-.4) and underdose frequency errors were associated with more ED visits (aIRR 1.5, 95% CI 1.1-2.1).

For medication knowledge and skills tasks, children of parents who underdosed pain medication had a higher rate of ED visits for pain. Health literate strategies to improve parents' medication skills may improve pain treatment at home and decrease healthcare utilization.