Pre-operative patient education to reduce post-operative care, complications, and anxiety

Capstone Change Proposal On How Pre-Operative Patient Education Reduces Post-Operative Care Complications and Anxiety.
Student’s Name:
Institutional Affiliation:
Background
Nurses are professionally tasked with duties to educate patients on several issues. Such education ranges from pain management, reduction of stress, and notification on drug side effects. In the recent past, medical costs have been on the rise forcing the public to use the funds saved for investments or emergency services to pay for medication (Baysal & Midilli, 2018). More patients additionally, prefer to continue with their treatments in their homes rather than staying in hospital facilities because of the high residential fees charged by hospitals (Herbert et al., 2017). Follow up activities after surgery and all other medications are, therefore, handled remotely. Patients, however, need more information on how to deal with the post-surgery impacts and trauma that might arise during such medical procedures (Bartik & Toruner, 2017). Pre-operative patient education is, therefore, a well –designed educational approach meant to train the patients on what to expect during the operations, and how to deal with post-surgery experiences. Such educational programs are, therefore, conducted by skilled medical practitioners who understand patients’ needs.
Clinical Problem Statement
Despite the fruitful coexistence between the pre-surgical department and surgery units in our healthcare facility, current nurses dispatched at the pre-operation departments require more training on the importance of pre-operation education and how to deliver such educational programs to the patients. The majority of patients recommended for surgery services often experienced fear and anxiety (Ead et al., 2017). Most of them have never been operated before, so they often have several questions to ask regarding the operations practices and any additional complications that might arise. The healthcare facility is expected to conduct a survey process when training of the nurses is complete to determine their feedback and level of satisfaction from such a course.
Purpose of the Change Proposal
The current change proposal helps in creating a smoother pre-operative patient experience for the patients. In the recent past, the pre-operation department has noted increased anxiety displayed by the patients recommended for surgery. Nurses working in the pre-operative units should, therefore, understand the importance of educating patients to create a better patient outcome and to minimize the chances for surgery complications among post-surgery patients (Liebner, 2015). Additionally, the current change proposal is purposely meant to reduce the chances for patient-readmission into the hospital. Re-admissions call for more medical bills and additional resources, thereby increasing the costs of medication (Liebner, 2015). The current change proposal, therefore, aims at enhancing the patient’s medical; experiences in the healthcare facility.
PICOT Question
The PICOT statement for the current change proposal reads; in an acute care inpatient hospital (P), does post-operative education from pre-operative nurses (I) help to decrease postoperative anxiety/complications and readmissions in surgical patients (O) compared to lack of post-operative education (C) within six months (T)? The evidence-based capstone project seeks to determine whether the presence of pre-operative education would help in reducing patients’ anxiety and possible after-surgery complications. According to Bartik and Toruner, (2017), answering patient’s questions before operations ensures that they retain more information and reducing their chances of more stay in the healthcare facilities. The pre-operation education is also expected to entail plain and understandable language that most patients can relate to, without using jargon or medical terms that might limit them from properly understanding the information.
Literature Search Strategy Employed
The literature search involved the use of keywords and phrases to obtain scholarly sources from the journals. The latest research studies regarding the importance of pre-operation education in healthcare settings were, therefore, given more priority compared to the old literature. A primary reason for this was to ensure that all the information retrieved from these sources were current. The chosen literature was also screened based on the themes and date of publication to ensure that they were all similar to each other. Phrases like pre-operative education, stress management among patients, plus many more were employed to enhance accuracy throughout the study. All the selected journals were also peer-reviewed to enhance the credibility of the sources.
Evaluation of Literature
All the selected literature for this change proposal displayed consistency in the importance of pre-operative education in reducing patient anxiety and post-operative complication. As witnessed from the studies, some literature employed qualitative research designs while others employed quantitative research design. For example, research conducted by Georgia et al (2017), Laura (2015), Cindy et al. (2015) were all qualitative. Xiaona et. al. (2019), Ebru and Tulay (2016), and Amy (2017) all conducted quantitative research. Using this literature in the current change proposal helps by providing important views and outcomes from complete researches. Such literature can, therefore, help in forming a basic foundation upon which future researches are built. More research is, however, required to fill several literary gaps evident from the selected research.
Applicable Change/ Nursing Theory Applied
Kurt Lewin’s change theory...