The Psychosocial Influences of Waiting Periods on Patients Undergoing Endoscopic Submucosal Dissection.
Noriko Nagao, Aya Tsuchiya, Sae Ando and 3 others
PMID 26987103WHAT IT FOUND
Patients waiting about 46 days for endoscopic submucosal dissection described both calmness and uneasiness, including anxiety about cancer progression, complications and recurrence, and coping behaviours.
Self-efficacy scores showed no clear differences by waiting period, age, gender or tumour location.
Key findings
01The average wait from hospital reservation to endoscopic submucosal dissection admission was 46.28 days, with a range of 3 to 171 days.
02Interview themes divided waiting-period perceptions into calmness and uneasiness, and coping behaviours into phone inquiries, staying busy, anxiety relief and impaired daily functioning.
03Self-efficacy score groups showed no significant differences in relation to waiting period, age, gender or tumour location.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
Read the rest of this summary
You get three full summaries a month, free, and we do not ask for a card. Search, the TL;DRs and your library stay unlimited either way.
What it does not show
This was a single-centre descriptive study. Patients' experiences may not apply to other hospitals or health systems. No intervention was tested. The paper cannot show that wait-time information, follow-up contact or education reduces anxiety or improves quality of life. Patients were generally early-stage and symptom free. Findings may not apply to patients with advanced or symptomatic cancer. Perceptions and coping behaviours were not linked statistically to self-efficacy scores. The study did not compare different waiting periods, so anxiety cannot be attributed to the wait itself. The written results sentence describing General Self-Efficacy Scale groups conflicts with Table 1. Table 1 lists 39 as low and 46 as neutral, while the sentence lists 39 as neutral. Only patients able to independently express a desire to participate were included.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that giving patients wait-time information or follow-up appointments reduces anxiety or improves quality of life. The study described patients' perceptions and coping behaviours and did not test these actions.