ABSTRACT
RATIONALE: Epidermolysis bullosa (EB) is an inherited disease characterized by fragile skin with painful blistering, which requires lifelong skin and wound care. This case report describes the use of inhaled nitrous oxide (N2O) for procedural pain control at home during wound care in a young man with severe dystrophic EB. To our knowledge, only 1 case was reported by Ingelmo et al in 2017 regarding the use of N2O at home in a 4-year-old-child. To date, no such attempt has been made in adult patients. PATIENT CONCERNS: Our patient was a 28-year-old man. Frequent blisters appear spontaneously, and are often preceded by erythema and itching. Patient required daily treatment daily consisting of lancing blisters with a needle and emptying them by compression. DIAGNOSES: Severe recessive dystrophic EB diagnosed at the time of delivery. INTERVENTIONS: Procedural pain control was managed by the auto-administration of an inhaled N2O and air gas mixture. OUTCOMES: Conscious sedation with N2O leads to beneficial effects, such as reduction in dressing duration, acute procedural pain, local antibiotic needing, medication memory, anxiety, anticipatory pain, and fatigue after the dressing session. LESSONS: N2O analgesia is safe and effective, resulting in a significant reduction in procedural pain and an improvement in the quality of life of patients and their caregivers.
Subject(s)
Analgesia , Anesthetics, Inhalation/administration & dosage , Epidermolysis Bullosa Dystrophica , Epidermolysis Bullosa/complications , Epidermolysis Bullosa/therapy , Nitrous Oxide/administration & dosage , Pain Management/methods , Pain, Procedural/prevention & control , Adult , Analgesia/adverse effects , Analgesia/methods , Anesthetics, Inhalation/pharmacology , Blister/etiology , Blister/therapy , Humans , Male , Nitrous Oxide/pharmacology , Pain , Quality of LifeABSTRACT
Although national and international guidelines on the management of childhood and adolescent fever are available, some inadequate practices persist, both from parents and healthcare professionals. The main goal of bringing children's temperature back to normal can lead to the choice of inappropriate drugs or non-necessary combination/alternation of antipyretic treatments. This behavior has been described in the last 35 years with the concept of fever-phobia, caused also by the dissemination of unscientific information and social media. It is therefore increasingly important that pediatricians continue to provide adequate information to parents in order to assess the onset of signs of a possible condition of the child's discomfort rather than focusing only on temperature. In fact, there is no clear and unambiguous definition of discomfort in literature. Clarifying the extent of the feverish child's discomfort and the tools that could be used to evaluate it would therefore help recommend that antipyretic treatment is appropriate only if fever is associated with discomfort.
