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KMID : 0378019820250020083
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New Medical Journal
1982 Volume.25 No. 2 p.83 ~ p.92
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An Experimental Study of the Effect of Emotional Relaxation Technique on the Reduction of Preoperative Anxiety
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Abstract
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The study was designed to test the effectiveness of a nursing intervention in reducing preo￢perative anxiety in patients awaiting for an open heart surgery.
The treatment used for the experiment consists of two kinds. One is reassurance given to preoperative patients by structured information concerning what will be done to the patient and what one can expect through the operational procedures and as outcomes of the operation. The other is training of patients for Benson´s relaxation technique as the response incompatible with anxiety response.
The study was dope to 52 Surgical patients hospitalized to SNU Hospital during the period between May 1st, 1981 and June 30, 1981 to have an open heart surgery.
The patients were randomly assigned to Experimental and Control groups for an even distri￢bution by age, sex, and general condition of the patients. Pre-treatment evaluation of subjects for Trait Anxiety, Anxiety Behavior, and Blood Pressure yielded no significant differences between two groups.
After the treatment as designed was given to the Experimental group, both groups were tested on Spielberger´s Anxiety-State Scale, Wyatt´s Anxiety Behavior Scale and on the changes in Blood Pressure.
The following results were obtained;
1. Concerning with the hypothesis that the Post-treatment, Preoperative level of state an￢xiety as measured by Spielberger´s State-Trait Anxiety scale will be lower among patients in Experimental group as compared with those in control group was not approved by statistical analysis at 5% significance level between groups even though the mean anxiety score for the experimental group was slightly lower. This result is different from previous studies by John￢son, Flaherty, Aiken and others, whose studies have proven the effectiveness of Experimental treatment at a significant level.
2. With regards to the second hypothesis that anxiety behavior as measured by Wyatt´s Anxiety Behavior scale will be lower among the patients in Experimental group, the mean anxiety behavior score was actually higher for Experimental group than that of the Control group. This result might be illustrated as resulting from the possibility that through the imformation provided about the surgery the latent fear of operation may have sprung onto consciousness and raise temporarily of an overt anxiety behavior. Both Gruber´s study and Johnson´s study seem to support this argument.
3. The third and last hypothesis was that the Blood Pressure for the Experimental group will be lower as compared with that of the Control group.
However, the systolic and diastolic blood pressures were found not significantly different between two groups.
The arguments that might be posed for these results that show no significant difference between groups are twofolds. One relates to the experimental procedures and the other concerns with the measurement of the effect of the treatment.
The first is that because of many restrictions of preoperative patient´s conditions the effect of the treatment was measured after only one treatment was given whereas the effect of relaxation technique can be seen only after complete internalization of the technique as a pattern of response by himself through repeated practice. The second relates to the time of measurement and the subjectivity of the tools that are used to measure the effect of the treatment. The time elapse between experiment and the measurement was too great to insure the persistence of the effect of treatment. The self-report type anxiety scales used for the description of the feeling state and the anxiety behavior scale for observation are both subjected to the subjective control by the individuals.
Thus in all, the data obtained from this study for determining the effect of relaxation technique on the reduction of preoperative anxiety yields inconclusive results leaving the need for further investigations.
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