Experience of health care providers in taking care of anxious patients under surgery with spinal anesthesia: A qualitative content analysis study

Anxiety is a common experience in patients undergoing surgery. It is one of the major challenges for preoperative health care providers. The aim of this study was to explore the experience of health care providers in taking care of anxious patients under surgery with spinal anesthesia.

This qualitative content analysis study was conducted at a referral hospital in Gonbad-e-Kavous city, northeastern Iran, between 2020 and 2021. Data were collected through semi-structured individual interviews. The primary focus of this research was to explore the perspective of health care professionals when providing care to nervous patients who are being considered for surgery with spinal anesthesia. The study included 16 health care providers who had experience in caring for anxious patients undergoing surgery with spinal anesthesia. Participants were selected using purposive sampling. Interviews were implemented in MAXQDA 10 software and then analyzed by the conventional content analysis method.

Five main categories and 19 subcategories were extracted from data analysis. The categories included “emergence of anxiety,” “basis of anxiety formation,” “patient advocacy,” “abilities of health care providers,” and “anxiety management factors.”

Health care providers consider patient anxiety as a problem that can be affected by various factors. Different methods are used to manage patients' anxiety, but it is necessary to apply appropriate context-based interventions.