Tricks to get kids to cooperate with treatment

Specialties Pediatric

Published

What tricks do you use to get kids to cooperate with treatment? I'm not a nurse (yet) but I am a mom of five and I know how hard it is just to get my own kids to go along with it when they need to take medication, wound care and even everyday personal hygiene and grooming.

Specializes in PICU, NICU, L&D, Public Health, Hospice.

hhhmmm...

Don't ever ask permission to complete a procedure..."it's time to change your dressing, okay?".

Study the growth and development of the age groups you deal with.

I often engaged the kids in silly stuff while I was doing the serious stuff...I learned a bunch of silly kids songs and we often sang them during procedures.

Give them permission to cry...it is okay to cry...just not okay to hit or bite.

Use the family to help keep the child feeling safe and secure whenever possible.

Try to remain as calm as possible, even when the child is ballistic...if you escalate the child WILL escalate more.

Lots of folks have given you good suggestions...good luck!

Specializes in special-needs kids.

This is absolutely awesome! i love all of these, and i think the real reason is that pediatric nurses are the best! It seemed to me on my out-rotation to the children's hospital that taking the IV out was the worst. i felt like i didn't see very good interaction with the kids by the nurse when this was happening: they just had mom hold the kids, and basically just tried to do it quickly. Is this the way it is? Isn't there any way to make it easier on those poor kids?

Thank you!

+ Add a Comment