A Comparative Study of Two Different Heel Lancet Devices for Blood Collection in Preterm Infants

ABSTRACT

PURPOSE: To evaluate two different heel lancet device in terms of pain response and success of the procedure in the preterm infants undergoing heel puncture. METHODS: 100 preterm infants undergoing capillary blood gas analysis or capillary bilirubin monitoring underwent heel puncture, were randomly allocated to blood sampling from the heel with either a conventional manual lancet or an automatic incision device. Primary outcome measures included the Premature Infants Pain Profile (PIPP) score, total duration of procedure, number of heel puncture and number of bruise. The pain response was evaluated using PIPP score and the effectiveness was evaluated using three criteria total duration of blood sampling, number of puncture, bruising of the heel or ankle. Statistical analysis was performed using the SPSS ver. 13.0 program. Difference between the groups were analysed with t test (continuous variables) and the Chi square test or Fisher test (categorical variables). RESULTS: The mean PIPP score was 4.91 for the automatic lancet group compared with 5.84 for the conventional manual lancet group (P=0.0255).The number of pain scores above 7 during blood collection did not differ between two groups (P=0.2167). The procedure took less time to perform in the automatic lancet group (mean, 30.69 seconds) than in the conventional lancet group (mean, 48.92 seconds) (P<0.0001). CONCLUSION: This study demonstrated that the automatic lancet device causes less pain and a shorter procedure time than the conventional manual lancet in preterm infants undergoing heel puncture. On the basis of these results the automatic lancet device is very useful method for blood collection in preterm infants by heel puncture.