Testing Katharine Kolcaba Theory of Comfort on Post-Operative Children

Aim of study was to test Katharine Kolcaba theory of comfort by evaluating the effectiveness of integrative comfort care interventions on discomfort experienced by children (age 5-10 years) during post-operative period. Method - experimental approach, pre-test and post-test control group design, was used for evaluating the effectiveness of integrative comfort care interventions on discomfort experienced by children. Sample comprised of 200 children, selected using purposive sampling technique and they were randomly assigned to experimental and control group by using flip a coin method. Katharine Kolcaba comfort theory framework was applied to assess patient’s condition, plan and deliver integrative comfort care interventions, the steps followed for data collection, planning and implementing effective care were based on the presuppositions of the theory. The tools used for data collection were Base line information of children. Comfort Behaviors check list, and Comfort Daisies. Comfort care interventions were delivered through nursing process approach. These interventions were addressed across physical, psychological, social, spiritual, and environmental aspects. After the application of theory, the analysis revealed improvement in the comfort level of the subjects. Mann –Whitney test was used to find out the significant difference in post-test post-operative discomfort scores among subjects in experimental and control group, findings were significant at <.001. Friedman test was also used to compare the pretest and posttest post-operative discomfort scores of children in experimental group, A significant difference (χ 2 =282.714, P<.001) in pretest and posttest post-operative discomfort scores of the subjects was observed. A significant difference (χ 2 =281.788, P<.001) was observed among subjects in experimental group as assessed by Comfort Daisies. Hence, concluded that integrative comfort care interventions were effective in reducing the post-operative discomfort significantly among the subjects. The findings revealed that subjects, who received integrative comfort care interventions, using comfort theory experienced more comfort as compared to the subjects in the control group.