Psychological Pressure of Family Members in Surgical ICU during Early Rescue Period for Critically Ill Patients: A Survey and Strategy Analysis

Objective To investigate the psychological pressure for the family members among critically ill patients in surgical ICU in the early period of rescue.Methods Using convenience sampling,99 patients' family members from five grade-III level-A hospitals were surveyed by the Symptom Check List-90(SCL-90) on their psychological pressures for further analyzing its influencing factors.Results The scores of somatization,anxiety and illiberal factors in the subjects were higher than those of the norm,but the score of interpersonal relationship factor was lower.There were statistical differences in the compulsive and psychotic factors between the family members of different living environments(P=0.028) and the hostility factor between the family members with different educational levels(P=0.043).The family members with pressure scores more than 7 in ICU got higher scores in the factors of somatizaion,compulsive,interpersonal relationship,expression,anxiety and hostility and horrible than those with pressure scores ranging from 3 to 7(P0.05).Conclusion When confronted with the same pressure,the family members who live in the city have higher incidence of psychological problems.Medical staff should pay more emphasis on communicating with the family members with low educational levels to help them understand the efforts medical staff have done for them.The perception of pressure for the family members is coincident with the results.Medical staff should communicate with them about their feelings,and take positive guidance for those with psychological stress score more than 7 to reduce the incidence of psychological problems.