A STUDY TO DETERMINE THE CONTRIBUTING FACTORS FOR ICU STRESS AND TO ASSESS THE EFFECTIVENESS OF INTERVENTION PACKAGE IN REDUCING STRESS AMONG PATIENTS ADMITTED IN ICU

The experience of an ICU is extremely stressful and disruptive for patients and family members. The environmental factors have affected the safety, patient outcome in ICU. Survivors of critical illness face a prolonged period of recovery due to physical weakness, malnutrition, breathlessness, lot of muscle mass and cognitive dysfunction. The Physical Environment such as noise, constant light, Sensory overload is implicated in ICU syndrome. Tactile touch therapy is the practice of massage which include Physical and Psychological outcome of the client. Psychoacoustic therapy is a Powerful distracter from distressful sounds and thoughts in the ICU. The Present study is aimed to determine the contributing factors for ICU stress and to assess the effectiveness of intervention package in reducing stress among patients admitted in ICU.A quasi experimental study with control group pretest and posttest design was adopted. A total of 200 samples admitted in ICU were selected. Convenience sampling technique was used. Contributing factors for ICU stress was assessed by Environmental Stressor Questionnaire(ESQ).The stressor identified were interpersonal, extra personal, and intrapersonal factors both in control and intervention group. Interpersonal factors (88%&87.5%)contributed. More than the Extra personal(86%&86.5%)and Intrapersonal factors(84.7%&84.7%).Psycho acoustic therapy along with Tactile touch therapy were administered to intervention group for five days. Level of stress was assessed by Modified Stress scale. The result revealed that majority of the samples had high level stress in intervention group(54%)and control group(51%).After the intervention. Overall post test mean score of stress in experimental group is 38.14 (SD 7.54) the t value is 30.78 which is statistically significant at 0.05 level.