Neonatal Pain Suffering, Pain, and Risk of Brain Damage in the Fetus and Newborn

This completely revised and updated edition offers a comprehensive overview of neonatal pain assessment and treatment. It includes the field of fetal surgery, and many other topics have been updated or added, such as circumcision analgesia, new drugs, new insights into neurophysiologic pathways of neonatal pain and new drawbacks of analgesic drugs. While in the early years of the 21st century pain treatment in neonates was still optional, it is now a tenet, and more and more institutions are looking for inspiration and good references to create their own guidelines. Written by leading researchers in the field, this book provides that inspiration and offers a valuable tool for neonatologists, anesthetists, nurses and physiotherapists. Since it also deals with prenatal and postnatal surgery, it also appeals to surgeons.

PART I  Delivery and Pain.- Gonadal Hormones and Pain Modulation.- Stress and Pregnancy: CRF as Biochemical Marker.-  Pain Control During Labour.- PART II Fetal Pain.- Ultrasound and Fetal Stress: Study of the Fetal Blink-Startle Reflex Evoked by Acoustic Stimuli.- Prenatal Affective Exchanges and Their Subsequent Effects in Postnatal Life.- Pain in the Fetus.- New Insights into Prenatal Stress: Immediate and Long-Term Effects on the Fetus and Their Timing.- PART III Neonatal Pain.- Pain Assessment and Spectral Analysis of Neonatal Crying.- Analgesic Procedures in Newborns.- Nonpharmacological Treatment of Neonatal Pain.- Sensory Saturation: An Analgesic Method.- Pharmacologic Analgesia in the Newborn.- Physical Stress Risk Agents in Incubators.- Fetal surgery analgesia.- PART IV Pain: a Risk Factor for Brain Damage.- Neonatal Stressors.- New Insights into Neonatal Hypersensitivity.- From the Gate-Control Theory to Brain Programs for Neonatal Pain.- PARTV Pain and Communication.- Disclosure of Pathology to the Newborn’s Family.- Communication of Diagnosis: Pain and Grief in the Experience of  Parents of Children with a Congenital Malformation.- Invest in Prenatal Life: A High-Yield Stock.

Dr. Bellieni, author of two chapters in the Encyclopedia of Pain, works at the University Hospital of Siena and is a member of several national and international societies, such as the European Society of Pediatric Research, the Italian Society of Pediatrics and the Italian Society of Neonatology. He is a member of the directive board of the Italian Society of Neonatology’s study group on pain and analgesia. He owns some patents for medical instruments used in neonatal care and pain assessment. He has more than 300 publications, mainly in the field of fetal and neonatal pain assessment and therapy.  He has been appointed as an expert on animal fetal pain assessment by the European Community Authority for Foodsafety (EFSA).