Effects of social interaction on distress and recovery from minor surgery in elective paediatric patients

Abstract

Thirty-six children aged 2-10 years, the majority of whom were males admitted for urogenital surgery, were observed for level and frequency of distress and type of social interaction over the duration of hospitalization. The results indicate that high levels of observed distress were associated with longer post-operative hospital stays. Staff interactions were associated with higher levels of distress while peer caretaking interactions were associated with lower levels of distress. We tested the hypothesis that social interaction lowered distress, leading to a briefer hospital stay. Using path analysis, we found peer caretaking interactions accounted for a small but significant percentage of the observed variance in duration of post-operative hospital stay. These data illustrate the potential importance of social environments in the maintenance or reduction of distress before and after paediatric surgery. This raises the expectation that certain types of social environments could facilitate recovery from surgery.