Strategies For Reducing Anxiety in Pre-Operative Adult Patients

Abstract

The paper is aimed at reducing pre-operative anxiety in adult patients. Pre-operative anxiety is the fear or anxiety experienced by patient preparing for surgery. The study was a descriptive survey research design. It was guided by one research question. The population of the study was 238 doctors and nurses working in the surgical wards of Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu Teaching Hospital Amaku, Awka, Anambra State, Nigeria. The entire population was used for the study. The instrument for data collection was questionnaire. The instrument was validated by two experts from the Department of Adult and Continuing Education and Science Education respectively, all from Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka. Data collected were analysed using Mean statistics and Standard deviation. The findings of the study show that all the twelve items except two were accepted as strategies for reducing pre-operative anxiety of adult patients. The respondents disagreed with” helping patient to accept that he is anxious”(2.48) and” massaging of patients hand before surgery” (2.49) ,as strategies for reducing anxiety. Based on the findings, it was recommended that surgical teams should take it, as a matter of duty, to explain to patient every bits of procedure they want to carry out on a patient