Three Enemies of Circadian Rhythm: Anxiety, Sleeplessness and Pain in Patients Following Open-Heart Surgery

Abstract

Objective: This study aimed to determine the relationship between preoperative anxiety and postoperative pain and perioperative sleep quality in open-heart surgery patients. Methods: It was a cross-sectional study. The research sample included 126 patients who underwent open-heart surgery for the first time and remained in intensive care for a maximum period of 48 hours. All patients’ procedures were performed with cardiopulmonary bypass and sternotomy. Data were collected using a Patient Identification Form, developed by the researcher and used to determine patients’ characteristics; the Anxiety Specific to Surgery Questionnaire (ASSQ), used to determine patients’ anxiety level; the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI), used to measure perioperative sleep quality, and the Numeric Pain Scale (NPS), used to determine postoperative pain levels. Results: Open-heart surgery patients experienced moderate levels of anxiety (27.28±8.48), moderate postoperative pain (4.30±2.29) and poor sleep quality (10.27±4.23) perioperative period. In this paper, a significant, weak, and positive correlation between ASSQ score and postoperative NPS score (r=0.318, p<0.05) was found; no correlation between the ASSQ score and perioperative PSQI score was found. It was determined that 90.48% (n = 114) of patients who underwent open heart surgery had poor sleep quality and there was no relation between preoperative anxiety and postoperative sleep quality. Conclusion: The authors concluded that preoperative anxiety impacts postoperative pain but has no effect on sleep quality for open-heart surgery patients in Turkish people.