Asking the patient to rate pain on a scale of 0 to 10 has its limits in the best of circumstances, but it is clearly useless with a newborn infant. Moreover, crying alone may not always be an accurate measure of pain, as other stimuli could be causing the crying.

Researchers at Vanderbilt University describe research indicating that it could be possible in the future to use a handheld device to measure cry acoustics of a neonate to determine whether the crying is caused by pain or some other stimulus, such as cold air.

The investigators recorded and digitally analyzed the acoustics of neonate cry reactions to 3 stimuli: brief room-temperature air puffs, cold-air puffs, and a heel lance that was also clinically required to collect a blood sample.

The research was presented by one of the investigators, Carrie Menser, MD, assistant professor of anesthesiology at Vanderbilt, at the 2016 meeting of the International Anesthesia Research Society (abstract S-245) and reported October 3, 2016, in Anesthesiology News.1

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