REFLETIVE ESSAY

Reflective Essay

Reflective Essay

Fear, anxiety, uncertainty, loss of control, and decrease of self esteem are emotional problems likely to be experienced by patients when confronted with the need for surgery and admission into hospital. Despite numerous evaluation trials demonstrating the success of preparation for surgery programs in decreasing aversive reactions, in every day practice most hospitals' patients do not receive such education and counseling [1]. It was pointed out by many researches that both patients and their families had familiarities in terms of anxiety and information needs that are more information about the procedure before the operation, operation date, the success and duration of the operation, likely occurrences after the operation such as tubes, drainage, and catheter, life style changes after the operation, and the effects of waiting for the operation on the patients and their families.

Several authors have shown that preoperative information given to patients improves their postoperative well-being. The literature indicates that well-informed patients experience less anxiety and are more easily mobilized. The patients also appreciate receiving information and tend to be more satisfied with the care they receive. Researches have demonstrated that stress and anxiety can have a detrimental effect on recovery after surgery and that effective preoperative information reduces stress, anxiety and pain levels. According to the article of Nelson; Lazarus stated that anxiety and stress were caused by fear, lack of knowledge about a situation, or not knowing how one will cope with it, makes one unable to control events or anticipate occurrence. This is particularly important for the cardiac patients who will require ventilation on an intensive care unit after a surgery and may have to undergo a number of invasive procedure [7].

It is desirable that health care professionals themselves conduct patient education, because they have regular and extensive contacts with patients while carrying out treatment and care task. Indeed, patients wish to receive information from 'their own' doctors and nurses [1]. Nelson had assessed whether patients' fears and anxieties were reduced by the provision of preoperative information before admission for surgery. One hundred percent of the patients felt that they benefited from the preadmission programs and 76% felt that their anxieties had been relieved [7]. Gillies had assessed whether patient information booklets increase preoperative anxiety. Of the 96% of patients who read the booklet provided, 99% found it helpful to some degree. Thirty-five percent of patients found that it worried them and do not increase their preoperative anxiety [12]. But there are also some studies finding no statistically significant effect of education on anxiety levels of different patients [13 and 14]. As mentioned by Cupples [15], in the study of Lepczyk; a group of patients having cardiac surgery was given education 2-7 days before their hospitalization, and another group of patients was given education 3-4 h after their hospitalization. The anxiety levels of the first and second group of the patients were found to be statistically insignificant.

Gibbs model

Social Learning Theory has been used to understand and intervene in health behaviors which ...