Background: Growing evidence supports skin cooling (cryoanalgesia) or skin vibration (vibroanalgesia) as potential techniques for pain alleviation.
Aims: To compare the effect of skin vibration using the Buzzy® vibration device with that of skin cooling for 2 minutes, as methods to reduce the pain of 1% lidocaine-epinephrine infiltration.
Methods & materials: Sixty healthy volunteers were recruited for this prospective study. Each subject received an intradermal injection of the anesthetic solution after application of the Buzzy® vibration device in one arm and another injection after ice application in the other arm. After each injection, the subjects rated pain of infiltration on a 100-mm visual analog scale. Pain scores were compared using a paired t test.
Results: Twenty-seven of sixty subjects (45%) reported that the 1% lidocaine-epinephrine infiltration after skin cooling was more painful than after skin vibration. Eleven subjects (18.3%) gave the same pain score for both techniques. The mean pain score ± SD was 30 ± 23.14 after skin cooling and 25.5 ± 24.1 after skin vibration. The difference between mean values was not statistically significant.
Conclusion: Skin vibration may be more effective than skin cooling in alleviating the pain caused by local anesthetic infiltration, although the difference was not statistically significant.
Keywords: cooling; dermatology; local anesthesia; pain; vibration.
© 2019 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.