1 in 1,000 children suffer with Juvenile Idiopathic Arthritis (JIA). And kids as young as 7 suffer with symptoms like aching joints, raging fever, and stinging bones. But they struggle to articulate it. And this means that HCPs can’t diagnose properly or prescribe the appropriate treatment.

Our brief was to find a way to bridge this communication gap and provide the tools to make communicating symptoms easier and more productive, therefore achieving better clinical outcomes.

Our solution is Painimals. A wild and wonderful vocabulary of animal analogies created for children suffering with JIA to best explain their pain. Expertly developed by patients, HCPs and language experts, it’s a new pain scale for children and a revolutionary way to articulate symptoms with a little help from our animals.

Wherever their pain is they can choose an animal to describe it. For example, it might feel like a rhino crushing their shoulder, or a bee stinging their knee.

Because our age group retains information better through storytelling, we introduced them to the Painimals through a book ‘The Bee on my knee’, which they could also keep, and use in their everyday lives. It tells the story of how brand characters Archie and Annie, discovered this new way to articulate their pain using animals as examples.

We wrote it so it rhymed in the silliest way possible. Our deliberately quirky rhymes that brought the animals to life in a way that made children giggle, join in and remember them.

To enhance HCPs consultations, we brought the animals to life with an AR filter. Children can choose the animal that most represent the type of pain and scale it to reflect the severity of the pain. its severity. Thus bridging the gap in communication and enhancing patient and doctor/nurse relationships.

We wrote and illustrated a rhyming childen’s book to teach the patients our new way of expressing their pain.

The book was given to HCPs in Juvenile Arthritis wards to give to their young patients. The app was available to the HCPs to use in their consultations.

Although it has only just been implemented into the market, Painimals is already creating a buzz among Healthcare Professionals and JIA patients alike.

"You’ve completely reimagined the pain scale in such an engaging way for kids.’ Sarah Dee, Paediatric nurse.

To understand the impact you really have to witness the HCP and patient speaking the same language at long last. And the connection that is made. So much so that Rocher Chugai are looking beyond the UK and aim to launch the book and AR app globally. The only regret is that we didn’t do it sooner.

“I wish I could have used this to help communicate my pain. I recognise the one about the beaver hugging your joints, when I used to flare, my joints were hot to touch.” Megan Ambler, JIA sufferer.