Re: Do babies feel pain?

Chris Goodfellow,

Of course babies feel pain, as also the fetus.  The real question is:  What is 
the quality of pain that a fetus or neonate feels?  Recent protocol in hospital 
settings more often than not calls for local anesthesia but the rabbinical 
technique usually does not call for anesthesia.

The difference is largely due to the difference in one’s view of pain and it 
management.  In the past, most doctors would say that an infant does not feel 
pain at a significantly high enough level for an outpatient type of minor 
surgery like circumcision to justify the pain felt by the administration of the 
anesthetic agent for pain management.  There is much circumstantial and 
anecdotal evidence to support this but very little prospective studies.

Of course, an infant can’t really tell you about the level of pain like an older 
child or an adult.  I have witnessed a number of circumcisions with and with out 
anesthesia and really have not observed any visible or audible qualitative (and 
probably quantitative) difference in the short “startle” reflex and one lusty 
scream from either (1) the lidocaine (local anesthetic) injection or (2) the 
“clamp” compression before cutting.  The most interesting technique observed was 
a set of concentric plastic rings that snapped together on the prepuce, one on 
the inside and the other on the outside, without anesthesia.  With one baby 
there was not even a “peep” when snapped on.  The skin was then cut and the 
plastic clamp left to fall off by itself in a week or two, much like the 
umbilical cord stump.Really, most minor procedures on babies could probably be 
done with no more pain that what the anesthesia would cause and you would also 
have no chance of side effects of the anesthetic agent.

Prospective research should be done to confirm my “seat-of-the-pants” opinion, 
however.See your library for the OLD surgery books to see what was recommended 
in earlier decades.  Certainly, centuries ago, the Israelites did not have 
anesthetics available.

Best regards,
Dr. S