Effectiveness of Family Centered Art Intervention on Anxiety among Hospitalised Children in a Tertiary Care Hospital, Mangaluru, India: A Quasi-experimental Study

Abstract

Introduction: Children become fearful, frightened, or unhappy when they attend the hospital. Art intervention can support their capacity to take responsibility and make decisions. It assists children and their families to explore and express their emotional reactions to the hospital admission, which can be difficult to explain. Aim: To find the effectiveness of family centred art intervention on anxiety among hospitalised children in selected tertiary care hospital, Mangaluru, Karnataka, India. Materials and Methods: A quasi-experimental study was conducted in Department of Paediatric, Yenepoya Medical College and Hospital, Mangaluru, Karnataka, India, from December 20, 2021, to April 10, 2022. A non probability purposive sampling technique was used to enlist study participants, who were then divided into the intervention (n=35) and control (n=35) groups. The level of anxiety was assessed on the first day of admission. Diversional activities were given to the hospitalised child in interventional group, for the first three days of admission, for a duration of 35-45 minutes per day and control group received routine care. The data was collected using the demographic performa, RMS (Raghavendra, Madhuri, Sujatha) pictorial scale and a parent report on their child’s anxiety. A post-test was done each day 30 minutes after the intervention. Analysis of Variance (ANOVA), Bonferroni posthoc test, Independent t-test and Chi-square-test were used for statistical analysis. Result: A total of 70 hospitalised children, aged between four to eight years, were split into two groups. There were 35 participants per group. The majority of the intervention group (25.7%) were seven-year-old, while the majority of the control group (34.3%) were four-year-old. A 60% of the intervention group participants and 74.3% of the control group participants were males, respectively. A comparison of anxiety scores at different points in the intervention group showed a significant decrease from pretest to post-test (p-value <0.05). The control group showed no difference (p-value>0.05), while at all the posttests, the difference in the anxiety level of children between groups was significant (p-value<0.05). Conclusion: In present study, family centered art intervention significantly reduced the anxiety among children in intervention group as compared to control group.