Efficacy of a pre-radiotherapy, nurse-led instructional program on anxiety level of patients receiving Radiotherapy (RT) for first time

Abstract

Author(s): Suha Kadhim AL-Zaidy* and Sadeq AL-Fayyadh

Background: Patients, family members, and caregivers may become anxious and apprehensive after receiving a cancer diagnosis and going through many treatment options, including both medical and surgical ones. In fact, 40% to 62% of patients reported feeling anxious prior to radiation, with the first session being the most stressful.

Aim: This study was conducted in order to evaluate the effectiveness of a preradiation therapy, nurse-led tailored instructional program increasing level of anxiety in adult patients undergoing RT for first time.

Methods: A quasi-experimental design, with the application of a pre-test/ posttest approach, was employed in this study. The study was conducted on 128 adult patients, who received RT at Maysan Center for Tumors Treatment. The patients were randomized into 2 groups: study group (n=64) and control group (n=64). Patients who were allocated to the study group received the nurse-led tailored instructional program which was introduced using direct face to face approach of educational counseling. The program was implemented in classroom-like session direction, which was designed and scheduled for approximately 30-45 minutes for 3 times per week. After 2-3 week of introducing the program for the study group only, all patients in this study sample were exposed to post test. Regarding the control group, the same above steps were followed except for the instructional program.

Results: The results show that there are highly significant differences between the pre and post-test in the study group, in terms of patient’s anxiety levels (M=11.87500, SD=4.38793, t (63)=21.650, p=0.0001) The effect size for this analysis (d=17.2(.while control group had no statistically significant differences between the pre and post-test (mean difference =-0.12500, p <-1.528).

Conclusions: The study illuminates that patients receiving radiation therapy for the first time in the targeted setting were having sever level of anxiety that has not been addressed by all their health care providers including nurses, about their scheduled management line. This reflect that nursing educational counselling is an overlooked duty. Of equal importance, the tailored nurse-led instructional program successfully prove its efficacy in managing subject’s anxiety.

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