Evaluation of patients’ awareness for elective surgery referred to Al-Zahra and Imam Reza hospitals in Tabriz on spinal and general anesthesia and their selection factors in the preoperative anesthetic in 2011-2012

Background: patients can develop complications and prevent unwanted side effects and additional costs on patients and hospitals by knowing methods of anesthesia. The purpose of this study is evaluating patients' awareness for elective surgery on spinal and general anesthesia and factors influencing their preference.

Methods: In study a cross-sectional method was developed to evaluate 273 elective surgery patients who admitted to Imam Reza educational hospital and Al-Zahra hospital in Tabriz over 90-91. A questionnaire was composed of two parts and data were collected over 90-91: Data were analyzed by SPSS software and a descriptive statistics method was applied to process the data using t-test.

Results: The spinal anesthesia method was the first choice of 63 patients due to wakefulness, alertness and other patients’ experience perception during the surgery operation. From this group 20.63 % did not have any preference for either methods. However, fear of surgery, panicking of being witness through the surgical procedure and not being vigilant in operation room during surgery were reasons for patients to go for general anesthesia method and 22.98% had no any specified reason for their choice. The t-test did find a significant correlation among level of awareness and understanding of methods of anesthesia, gender, occupation and education.

Conclusion: The majority of patients have a little knowledge about anesthesia methods. Therefore, improving patients’ awareness needs serious efforts of media and health centers, especially hospitals, doctors and the national anesthesia association. Unwell-educated patients need also more efforts improving their knowledge regarding anesthesia techniques.