As many of as three million children undergo anesthesia and surgery annually in the United States. Empirical evidence suggests that the prevalence of extreme preoperative anxiety in children ranges from 40 to 60%. Appropriate treatment of this clinical phenomenon is important as it leads to both psychological and physiological adverse outcomes.
Past research showed that increased levels of preoperative anxiety led to a more painful, slower, and more complicated recovery in an adult population, but whether or not this also held true for young children had yet to be determined. In Phase I of our two phase NIH funded study, we recruited 241 children, age 5-12 years scheduled to undergo elective outpatient tonsillectomy and adenoidectomy and admitted them to a research unit at Yale New Haven Children’s Hospital for observation. Postoperative pain and analgesic consumption were assessed every 3 hours and children were followed at home for the next 14 days. Results showed that preoperative anxiety in young children undergoing surgery is associated with a more painful postoperative recovery and a higher incidence of sleep and other problems.