Persistent pain affects a growing number of children and adolescents in Finland. This ethnographic study explores families' pathways through pediatric pain and its care in Finland by combining 1) child-centred methods for researching young people's experiences of pain; 2) in-depth interviews with parents; 3) observation of families' clinic visits; 4) interviews with clinicians and observation of professional trainings; and 5) extended case studies with selected patient families. PAINCARE provides new knowledge about how prolonged pain affects the everyday lives of families living in Finland; how the meanings and management of pain are negotiated in clinical encounters; and how gender, race and class shape the trajectories of pain and its care. It thus speaks to intersecting topical concerns: the decline in young people's well-being; the growing burden of chronic pain; the tensions of parenting amid burnout culture; and the future of care in Nordic post-welfare states.

2023

2027