Objectives: This study aimed to identify postoperative symptoms and related factors during the first three days after abdominal surgery. Subjects and methods: Data was collected from 147 patients undergoing elective surgery evaluating by Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale, Multi-Dimensional Social Support Scale and the Memorial Symptom Assessment Scale in pre-operation and three consecutive days of post-operation. | Journal of military pharmaco-medicine no3-2018 FACTORS RELATED TO POSTOPERATIVE SYMPTOMS AMONG PATIENTS UNDERGOING ABDOMINAL SURGERY Nguyen Hoang Long* SUMMARY Objectives: This study aimed to identify postoperative symptoms and related factors during the first three days after abdominal surgery. Subjects and methods: Data was collected from 147 patients undergoing elective surgery evaluating by Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale, Multi-Dimensional Social Support Scale and the Memorial Symptom Assessment Scale in pre-operation and three consecutive days of post-operation. Results: The results identified seven symptoms occurred, including pain, tiredness, sleeplessness, abdominal distension, urinary retention, anxiety, and dizziness. The overall mean score of symptoms was high on the first day then was decreased on the two following days. On the first day, symptoms were correlated to age (r = , p < ), length of operative procedure (r = , p < ), incision length (r = , p < ), and preoperative anxiety (r = , p < ). On the second day, only length of operation time significantly related to symptoms (r = , p < ). On the third day, there were age, length of operative procedure, and incision length associated with symptoms (r = , and , respectively). Conclusion: Post-operative symptoms need to be managed properly. Nurses should prioritize their symptoms management program to elderly patients as well as ones with long incision and long operative time. * Keywords: Abdominal surgery; Postoperative symptoms; Unpleasant symptoms; Related factors. INTRODUCTION Worldwide studies have repeatedly reported a high incidence of unpleasant symptoms following surgery [1]. From the same point of view, researchers interested in abdominal surgery demonstrated that symptoms following this type of operation were very problematic. For instance, 51% to 95% of patients reported suffering from at least moderate pain; 92% complained about
