Undergoing cardiac catheterization: the effects of informational preparation and coping style on patient anxiety during the procedure.

Objective: To examine the effects of coping styles and preparatory informational treatments on patient anxiety during cardiac catheterization.

Design: Prospective, experimental, random assignment, repeated measures design.

Setting: Canadian, university-affiliated, large urban hospital.

Subjects: 145 adult patients (107 men and 38 women) scheduled for their first cardiac catheterization. Age range was from 34 to 78 years. Mean educational level was 10.72 years.

Outcome Measures: Subject's coping style, "monitoring" (information seeking) or "blunting" (information avoiding) was assessed by means of Miller's Behavioral Style Scale. Subjects' anxiety was assessed using three measures: (1) a self-report measure, the Subjective Units of Distress (SUDS) Scale; (2) a behavioral measure, the Cardiac Catheterization Adjustment (CA) Scale; and (3) physiologic measures, heart rate and systolic and diastolic blood pressure.

Intervention: After coping style assessment, monitors and blunters were randomly assigned to receive one of three preparatory informational treatments: (1) videotaped procedural modeling information, (2) videotaped procedural-sensory modeling information, and (3) procedural-sensory information booklet.

Results: Analysis of variance techniques applied to the anxiety data revealed the following: (1) significant changes in self-reported patient anxiety occurred as a function of occasion rather than preparatory informational treatment or coping style, (2) subjects receiving the three preparatory informational treatments demonstrated significantly different behavioral adjustments during cardiac catheterization, and (3) most subjects demonstrated heart rate and blood pressure readings in the normal range; however, significant changes in cardiovascular reactivity were found to be associated with contrast dye insertion.

Conclusions: Subjects who received the videotaped modeling treatments demonstrated greater behavioral adjustment than patients who received the information booklet. Questions remain as to whether the procedural modeling treatment is more efficacious than the procedural-sensory modeling treatment. Increases in subjects' SUDS levels were found to be associated with changes in ideational content. Changes in blood pressure and heart rate were attributed to physiologic and psychologic factors. Coping style did not appear to significantly influence any of the measures of patient anxiety.