Impact of White Noise and Benson’s Relaxation Technique on Death Anxiety in Patients Undergoing Coronary Artery Bypass Graft Surgery: A Randomized Clinical Trial

Abstract

Background: Patients undergoing coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) surgery face a serious psychological problem called death anxiety, which can harm the patient physically, socially, and emotionally. White noise and Benson’s relaxation technique are among the complementary and effective treatments which help mitigate death anxiety in these patients.Aim: This study aimed to investigate the impact of white noise and Benson’s relaxation technique on death anxiety among patients undergoing CABG.Method: This randomized clinical trial study was performed on 60 hospitalized patients in Iran in 2020. The permutated block method was used to randomly divide the eligible participants into intervention and control groups. In the intervention group, participants accomplished Benson’s technique with white noise music on three consecutive occasions in the morning, afternoon, and before night sleep. The control group did not receive any intervention. The demographic and clinical characteristics form and Templer scale were used to collect data. Data were analyzed using SPSS software (Version 25).Results: The mean±SD age of the participants was 61.97±8.80 and 64.81±6.53 years in the intervention and control groups, respectively. The results showed a significant decrease in the mean score of death anxiety in the intervention group (P<0.05), while this score increased in the control group compared to the pre-training scores (P<0.05).Implications for Practice: Nurses are recommended to use white noise and Benson’s relaxation techniques as an effective intervention to reduce death anxiety in patients undergoing CABG surgery, and include them in the patient care and education programs.

Keywords

• benson relaxation
• coronary artery bypass graft surgery death anxiety
• white noise