The anxiety of patients under regional anesthesia: operating room healthcare providers’ point of view

 Preoperative anxiety is a widespread phenomenon in anesthesia, a challenging issue for the caring team in evaluating and managing patients’ anxiety. This study aimed to determine the operating room (OR) healthcare providers’ point of view on the patients’ anxiety under regional anesthesia.

 This cross-sectional study was conducted on 203 OR healthcare providers in the adult public educational hospitals of Golestan University of Medical Sciences, Gorgan, Iran, from April to November 2021. Eligible OR healthcare providers, including nurse anesthetists (104), surgical technologists (82), and anesthesiologists (17), were recruited through the census method. Data were collected using anesthesiologists’ perception of patients’ anxiety under a regional anesthesia questionnaire developed by Jlala (2010). The impact score was determined to ensure the face validity of the Iranian version of the questionnaire, and ten healthcare providers checked it qualitatively. The average score of the content validity index (CVI=0.978) and content validity ratio (CVR=0.978) were acceptable. The instrument’s internal consistency was evaluated using Cronbach’s alpha coefficient (α =0.675). Data were analyzed in SPSS software version 18 using Fisher’s Exact, Chi-Square, and Kruskal-Wallis tests.

  There were no differences in most questionnaire items between healthcare providers’ views based on their professional roles (P<0.05). More than half of the patients who were candidates for spinal anesthesia were anxious (57.1%). Incorrect information from non-experts, family, friends, and the media often increased patients’ anxiety (59.3%). The most commonly used method for managing patients’ anxiety is sedation using medication (40.9%) and relaxation techniques (35.5%).

Healthcare providers considered that anxiety of patients who were candidates for regional anesthesia was a prevalent problem that can be affected by various factors. All necessary facilities should be considered to create and maintain patients’ comfort in the OR.