A STUDY TO ASSESS THE EFFECTIVENESS OF PLAY THERAPY ON ANXIETY AMONG HOSPITALIZED CHILDREN.

Abstract

Background: Hospitalization can be a threatening and stressful experience for children. Because of unfamiliar with the environment and medical procedures and unaware of the reasons for hospitalization, it can result in children's anger, uncertainty, anxiety, and feelings of helplessness. Aim: The objectives of the study were to assess and compare the level of anxiety before and after the administration of play interventions among hospitalized children in experimental and comparison group and to determine the association of anxiety among hospitalized children with selected variables. Method: A Non-equivalent control group pretest-posttest design was used. Sixty participants were selected using purposive sampling (30 in experimental and 30 in the comparison group).The data was collected by "Structured Anxiety Rating Scale" with structured interview technique from participants. Result: The Findings of this study revealed that in comparison of posttest mean score of anxiety in experimental and comparison group, the obtained 't' value and 'p' value were 12.23 and 0.001 respectively, hence found to be significant (p < 0.05) at 0.05 level. Therefore the study concluded that play interventions are effective in reducing anxiety among Hospitalized Children. A significant association was found between Anxiety score and selected variables i.e. education of father (0.01), education of mother (0.01), occupation of father(0.03), family monthly income (0.04), place of residence (0.01) and type of family (0.01) and any medical personnel in family (0.04) in comparison group.