Factors influencing caregivers' uncertainty of children undergoing cardiac surgery in Bangkok, Thailand

Abstract

PurposeThis study aims to determine the factors influencing caregivers' uncertainty about children undergoing cardiac surgery in a tertiary hospital in Bangkok, Thailand.Design/methodology/approachA correlational predictive study was conducted among 75 caregivers of children from infancy to fifteen years old who were undergoing first time cardiac surgery in a tertiary hospital in Bangkok, Thailand. Four questionnaires were inquired to evaluate caregivers' uncertainty about the illness, and influential factors included (1) perception of the severity of the illness, (2) credible authority of health-care providers and (3) information and emotional support. The descriptive statistics, Pearson correlation coefficient and multiple regression analysis were used to analyze the data and influential factors.FindingsThe significant influential factors affecting caregivers' uncertainty were (1) perception of the severity of the illness (β = 0.413, p < 0.001), (2) credible authority of health-care providers (β = −0.287, p = 0.004) and (3) information and emotional support (β = −0.223, p = 0.026), and their explanation power was about 33.9 % (R2 = 0.339, F = 13.630, p < 0.001).Research limitations/implicationsA limitation of this study was that the researcher selected the sample group by convenient sampling and only caregivers of children who underwent cardiac surgery in Siriraj hospital were selected. Therefore, the sample group might have lacked variety and was not a good representative of the population. Future studies should be conducted by varying the setting and using randomized sampling.Practical implicationsThis study provides clear recommendations to assess the perception of the severity of the illness by caregivers, build credibility and trust by providing quality care and should develop information and emotional support interventions for reducing the levels of caregivers' uncertainty of children undergoing cardiac surgery.Originality/valueHealth-care providers should develop the appropriate intervention for reducing caregivers' uncertainty by assessing the perception of the severity of the illness, providing information and emotional support and building trust for the caregivers of the children who are undergoing cardiac surgery.

Mothers' Care for their Children with Open Heart Surgery

“…Regarding to children gender, this study results showed that less than two third of them were boys. This finding was in line with [17] who studied "Factors influencing caregivers' uncertainty of children undergoing cardiac surgery in Bangkok, Thailand" and reported that 58.6% of the studied children were males. However, this study disagreed with [4] who studied " Role of tracheostomy in pediatric patients who underwent heart surgery: a single-center experience " and reported that 50.8% of them were female.…”

Educational Videos to Reduce Parental Rejection of Pediatric Cardiac Catheterization during the COVID-19 Pandemic

“…We adjusted for confounding factors that may influence the level of parental uncertainty or anxiety [20,21]. These confounding factors included parental age, sex, and education (high: equal or higher than university level; low: equal or lower than junior college level); family income (high: family income more than USD 30,000 per year; low: family income equal or less than USD 30,000 per year); place of residence (urban or rural); presence of siblings; and children's age, sex, and heart disease type (PDA, ASD, or VSD).…”