Reducing medical fear among children using simulated health care spaces: A randomized controlled trial

Purpose

This study aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of an intervention that involved interactions within a simulated health care space to reduce medical fear among children in infant classes.

Methods

An experimental study involving 86 children divided into an intervention group and a control group with pre- and postintervention measurements was undertaken. The intervention, known as the Health-Friendly Program, consisted of showing children various scenarios that simulated different medical contexts so that they could interact in them, experiment with the materials and ask questions. Medical fear was evaluated using the Spanish version of the revised “Child Medical Fear Scale”, which provides a score of the medical fear level ranging between 0 and 34 points. The pretest and posttest levels of medical fear in the intervention and control groups were compared with Student's t test.

Results

The children in the intervention group experienced a significant reduction in fear by 3.21 points (SD: 6.50) compared to the children in the control group. This reduction in fear was shown in all four dimensions of the scale: intrapersonal fears, procedural fears, environmental fears and interpersonal fears.

Conclusion

The Health-Friendly Program provides an innovative intervention to reduce medical fear among children based on information, confrontation strategies and simulation scenarios. This study suggests the potential benefit of incorporating educational interventions in schools in collaboration with university and health care simulation centers.