The Effect of Skin Scraping Equipment on the Level of Fear in Pediatric Patients at Queen Sirikit National Institute of Child Health

Abstract

The objective of this study was to evaluate the effects of the different  types of blades on the level of fear  of pediatric  patients  going  through a skin scraping  procedure at Queen  Sirikit National  Institute  of Child  Health, A comparison was made between  using a plastic blade and a stainless steel banana blade on children. A cross-sectional survey was conducted on 30 participants from  January to June  2018, Those  participants were children between  the ages of 3 to 6 years old that was diagnosed  with skin fungal  infections,  in which they were required  to get at least 1

square  centimeter (cm2)   of  skin  scraping. Data  was  collected  by  using  a  questionnaire

and  observing  the level of fear  in participants. Results  from  the data  were analyzed  by using percentages, mean average, and standard deviation  and  compare  the average  fear  of scraping the  skin  using  stainless  steel  banana  blades  in  the  control  group and  plastic  blades  in  the experimental group  using statistics  Mann-Whitney U Test.

A majority  of the participants, 15 each, in the experimental group consisted  of 66.7%

males while those in the control group consisted of 53.3% females. The level of fear was assessed before  the actual  skin scraping and  during  the skin  scraping   procedure. In  the experimental group, the mean level of fear  before using the plastic blade was 1.867 and the standard deviation was 0,256.  On  the other  hand, the control  group had the mean  level of fear  before  using the banana  blade at  2.800  and  the standard deviation  was 0.518  with a p-value of 0.122.  When the  mean  and  standard  deviation were  compared   between   the  two  groups, there  were  no tatistically significant differences. However,  when  the level of fear  was evaluated  during the skin procedure, there were statistically significant differences in the mean and standard deviation between the two groups  where p-value < 0.05. The mean level of fear in the experimental group was 1.600,  while the mean level of fear in the control  group reached  a high 3.8.

In  conclusion,  using  a  plastic  blade  rather   than  the  banana  blade  during the  skin scraping procedure helps to reduce  the level of fear in pediatric  patients.