Abstract
To evaluate the effects of Dramatic Therapeutic Play (DTP) technique on the degree of anxiety in hospitalized school-age children. Randomized clinical trial performed in two hospitals ofSão Paulo, between May and October 2015. The intervention consisted of the application of DTP and the outcome was evaluated through the Child Drawing: Hospital (CD: H) instrument. The Wilcoxon-Mann Whitney, Corrected t, Fisher's exact and Chi-square tests were used in the analysis. Statistical significance was set at 5%. In all, 28 children participated in the study. The majority of children (75%) had a low anxiety score, with a mean CD: H score of 73.9 and 69.4 in the intervention and control groups respectively, and with no significant difference. Children submitted to DTP had the same degree of anxiety as those in the control group. However, it is suggested that new studies be performed with a larger number of children in different hospitalization scenarios.
Highlights
Hospitalization represents a hostile and unfamiliar event for the child, since he or she is submitted to hospital procedures and therapeutic treatments that can cause pain as well as physical and psychological suffering
The Child Drawing: Hospital (CD): H score was compared between the control group and the intervention group of children who underwent the dramatic therapeutic play session after being submitted to peripheral intravenous puncture
The study hypothesis was that school children submitted to the Dramatic Therapeutic Play (DTP) session would have lower CD: H anxiety scores than those not submitted to the proposed intervention
Summary
Hospitalization represents a hostile and unfamiliar event for the child, since he or she is submitted to hospital procedures and therapeutic treatments that can cause pain as well as physical and psychological suffering. The school-age child is able to present some understanding about the disease; is still vulnerable to events that diminish their sense of control and power. Disease is a factor that takes control of the child, leading to boredom and frustration, with resulting hostility and even depression[4]. The child needs to receive appropriate and atraumatic assistance for their recovery in order to minimize the stress generated by hospitalization. In this sense, the company of their family and implementation of recreational activities in hospital settings are recommended and studies have demonstrated this can reduce stress and anxiety[5,6,7]
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