Abstract
Pain management for the general adult population can present its challenges. However, pain management for children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) or developmental delay (DD) offers a unique set of obstacles. The first challenge comes in assessing the child’s pain due to both communication difficulties and self-reports. The second difficulty presents in treating pain; children with ASD or DD have different coping skills and might benefit from techniques like hypno-analgesia and multisensory environments (MSE). Moreover, there are very few studies and limited research on effective pain management practices for children with ASD or DD. This chapter will focus on children with ASD/DD and discuss epidemiology, pain management, coordination of care, and challenges in treating this population.
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McNeil, S.E. et al. (2022). The Management of Chronic Pain in Children with Autism and Developmental Disability. In: McPherson, P. (eds) Handbook of Treatment Planning for Children with Autism and Other Neurodevelopmental Disorders. Autism and Child Psychopathology Series. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-06120-2_17
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