The effect of home visit on anxiety of mothers with preterm infant discharged from neonatal intensive care unit

Context: After being discharged from hospital, most preterm infants need to receive treatments such as gastric gavage, oxygen therapy, apnea control, and medication. Mother's unpreparedness to care for their infants causes anxiety for them. Aims: The purpose of the present study was to investigate the effect of home visit on anxiety of mothers having preterm infant discharged from neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). Settings and Design: This was a experimental control group study on 50 mothers with preterm infant discharged from NICU of Shahid Sadoughi Hospital, an educational hospital with 30 beds in a city in the west of Iran in 2019. Subjects and Methods: Participants with a convenience sampling were randomly assigned in the experimental and control groups. In the experimental group, home visit was done on the 3rd and 5th days after discharging the infants, and the mothers received necessary instructions proportional to their needs. Data collection tools included demographic information and Spielberger State-Trait Anxiety Inventory. Statistical Analysis Used: The findings were analyzed by SPSS 20 software using Kolmogorov–Smirnov, independent t-test, and Chi-square. Results: The mean ages of the participants in the intervention and control groups were 30.59 ± 6.38 and 28.67 ± 5.05 years, respectively. There was no significant difference between the mean obvious and hidden anxiety in the two groups (P > 0.05) before the intervention. However, after the intervention, the mean obvious and hidden anxiety in the experimental group was lower than the mean of the control group, and this difference was significant (P