Background: To investigate the interventional efficacy and clinical significance of graded psychological nursing care for patients who have undergone cardiothoracic surgery by providing graded psychological nursing care for these patients according to the results of their psychological evaluation.
Methods: In this interventional study, 110 patients who had undergone cardiothoracic surgery between 2014 and 2015 in the First Affiliated Hospital of Harbin Medical University, Harbin, Heilongjiang Province, China, were enrolled. We divided them into two groups of 55 patients each, namely, a control group and a treatment group. For patients in the control group, we applied regular psychological nursing care; those in the treatment group were further divided into three different psychological grades after being assessed using Symptom Checklist 90 (SCL-90) and the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI); patients at each grade were treated by graded psychological nursing care in addition to regular psychological nursing care.
Results: Significant decreases, with statistically significant differences (P<0.01), were observed in the SCL-90 and PSQI scores of patients in the treatment group as compared with the control group. Patients in the treatment group, who underwent graded psychological nursing care according to their varying psychological conditions, showed better improvement in their post-surgery emotional state and sleep quality than those in the control group, thus indicating the great significance of graded psychological nursing care in clinical practices.
Conclusion: Applying graded psychological nursing care in post-operation cardiothoracic patients improved nursing care efficiency and alleviated patients' negative feelings. Therefore, this type of nursing care should be further promoted and utilized in clinical practice for effective rehabilitation of patients.
Keywords: Graded psychological nursing care; Pittsburgh sleep quality index; SCL-90 score.