J Nurs Acad Soc.  1981 Jun;11(1):45-64.

A Study of the Anxiety Levels of Hospitalized Psychiatric Patients in Terms of Length of Hospitalization

• Kim YH

Abstract

This study was done to detenine the relationship between the anxiety levels of hospitalized psychiatric patients and various influencing variables. The purpose of this study was to determine factors that may help hospitalized psychiatric patients to experience lower levels of anxiety in relation to changing situations and provide the basic data for a dynamic approach which is important in the field of modern psychiatric nursing that understands and analyses the meaning of patients behavior. The anxiety may produce stress, which is a common experience among all human beings. Patients may merely feel uncomfortable in the state of mild anxiety, however, the severe state could be an obstacle to treatment and recovery from disease. The anxiety of the psychiatric patient is a factor which greatly influencing the patient's behavior, so his disorderd behavior is an expression of defence or pathologically fixed behavior. According the psychiatric patient's anxiety at the time of admission is the concern of the health team. The nurse's special concern has to do with understanding and supporting the patient and meeting his individual needs by frequent close contacts during the entire hospitalization period, compared to other teammembers the nurse's responsibility in this regard is greated. So this study emphasizes the necessity of creating conditions these, but above all the psychiatric nurse should create a therapeutic environment by not only regarding the patient's behavior or symptoms but understanding the meaning of them. The subjects of this study were 57 psychiatric patients selected from the K neuropsychiatric hospital located in Kunsan city. Data were collected twice from the same patients within a 24 hour period after admission and 10 days after admission. (September 18th to November 8th, 1980). The data collected method was through direct interview, and the interview time was 20 minutes for each patient. Data analysis included Item Analysis & Internal Consistency Reliability Tests, Percentages, t-test, analysis of variance and stepwise multiple regression analysis. The findings of this sudy were as follows. A. Test of Hypothesis a. Hypothesis 1: "The anxiety level of psychiatric patients within 24 hours after admission will be higher than those of the same patients 10 days after admission," was accepted, (t = 3.15; p < 0.005) b. Hypothesis 2: "The more the number of admissions the higher the level of anxiety related to two categories", was accepted, (affective anxiety: F - 5.50, p

MeSH Terms

Anxiety*
Hospitalization*
Humans
Jeollabuk-do
Psychiatric Nursing
Statistics as Topic