Abstract:

Objective To investigate the application of health education pathway on the relatives of patients with lung cancer during perioperation. Methods One hundred and seventeen relatives of patients with lung cancer undergoing surgical treatment were divided into control group (hospital admission between January 2009 and June 2009, n=58) and experiment group (hospital admission between July 2009 and December 2009, n=59) according to different time of hospital admission, and were intervened by conventional health education and self-designed health education pathway respectively. The mastery of disease-related knowledge and nursing skills, satisfaction with quality of nursing during hospitalization and compliance to advice from doctors were compared between relatives of patients in two groups, and the length of hospital stay, cost of hospitalization and prevalences of complications were also compared between patients in two groups. Results The relatives of patients in experiment group gained better results than those in control group in mastery of disease-related knowledge and nursing skills, satisfaction with quality of nursing during hospitalization and compliance to advice from doctors （P<0.05）. Compared with patients in control group, those in experiment group had shorter length of hospital stay, less cost of hospitalization and lower prevalence of complications, with significant differences between two groups (P<0.05). Conclusion Application of health education pathway on relatives of patients with lung cancer can improve the quality of medical nursing and disease-related recognition of relatives, which may enhance the participation of relatives of patients in medical treatment and nursing, instruct the cooperation of patients with medical treatment and promote the rehabilitation of patients.

Key words: health education pathway, lung cancer, relatives of patients, health education