An Everyday Phrase May Harm Your Patients

Venous blood sampling is one of the most common diagnostic medical procedures performed in clinical practice. It has been shown that negatively loaded words may result in negative affective reactions and, consequently, in an increased perception of pain. We aimed to evaluate whether common warnings before venous blood sampling might induce unnecessary pain.We included 100 healthy participants (50 females, 50 males) who were randomized to one of...