Assessing children's and adolescents' pain.

Problems related to the complex task of pain assessment in children and adolescents are identified. Solutions to the problems are presented by describing a variety of tools currently available to assess three distinct dimensions of pain: location, intensity, and quality. Characteristics and strengths of a variety of tools are discussed and examples of each are included. Presented are body outlines to report location, and a variety of tools appropriate for measuring intensity from young preschoolers to adolescents. Worldwide current work describing the development of word lists to describe childhood pain quality is summarized.