Fear of needles

Fear of needles, formally known as needle phobia, is the extreme fear of medical procedures involving injections or hypodermic needles. It is occasionally called aichmophobia, though that term can also cover a broader fear of sharply pointed objects. The condition was formally recognized in 1994 when it was included in the DSM-IV as a specific phobia of the blood-injection-injury type. Severe cases cause people to avoid inoculations, blood tests and sometimes all medical care. Prevalence estimates suggest at least ten percent of American adults experience some degree of needle fear, likely an undercount given underreporting; under stricter diagnostic criteria for blood-injection-injury phobias specifically, prevalence drops to roughly three to four percent of the general population. Prevalence among children has risen substantially, from twenty-five percent in 1995 to sixty-five percent in 2012 according to research cited in the article, a rise attributed by researcher Amy Baxter to increased booster shot administration around age five, when lasting phobic associations can form. Unlike most phobias, severe needle phobia carries some risk of proving fatal through vasovagal shock-related complications.