The effect of hospital preparation on anxiety and fear levels of school-age children

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of a hospital preparation program in the reduction of anxiety and fear in school-age children. A quasi-experimental design was us~d •. This study found that the videotaped. preparation program (Appendix F) did not produce significantly lower anxiety and medical fear levels in children viewing the videotape when compared to children who -did. not view the videotape. The results further suggest that there is a positive relationship between anxiety and fear of medical experiences in school-age children who are hospitalized. Children in this study who reported a high degree bf anxiety also tended to report high fear levels at all times. The Pearsori prciduct' moment technique was used to determine cor~~lations for selected variables~- A two-way repeated measures multiple analysi~ of variance procedure was used to examine changes in the children's fear and anxiety over time during hospitalization. The significant level for the rejection of the ·hypotheses· for this: study.was .05.