Determination of Nursing Care Needs of Patients Undergoing Major Surgery

Aim: The study was planned to determine the nursing care needs of patients undergoing major surgical interventions (bypass, total hip replacement, brain tumor, cystectomy, lung resection-lobectomy, whipple) on the first postoperative day and to examine the relationship between these needs and socio-demographic and clinical characteristics. Method: The population of the descriptive study consisted of nurses (N=124) who provided care to patients who under went major surgical intervention on the 1st postoperative day between November 2022 and January 2023 in a private university hospital. The sample consisted of 111 nurses and 111 patients selected from the defined population. The research data were collected using the 'Nurse Information Form','Patient Information Form' and 'Perroca Patient Classification Scale'. The data were collected by the researcher using face-to-face interview method. Data collection was completed between 10-15 minutes. The data obtained were analyzed with appropriate statistical methods using the SPSS program. Ethics committee and institutional permissions were obtained from the institution where the study was conducted. Results: It was observed that the mean age of the nurses who performed the diagnosis was 25,51 (2,21) years, 83,8% were female, 94,6% had a bachelor's degreeand 78,4% had been working as ward nurses, had for an average 33,72 (20,90) months professional experience. The majority of the patients underwent surgery in general surgery (29,7%) and thoracic surgery (23,4%) clinics, and 68,5% received postoperative treatment and care in intensive care.According to the Perroca Patient Classification Scale, the patients were found to have 'above intermediate level (20,50)(4,86)' care needs. It was observed that some individual and disease characteristics of the patients (education level, BMI, smoking/alcohol use, presence of critical disease, need for postoperative intensive care) affected the levels of care requirement. Conclusion: It is recommended that patient classification scales should be utilized for complete data collection and systematic evaluation in determining the level of care needs of patients inthe postoperative period.