ABSTRACT
The purpose of this study was to determine the factors which affect anxiety of family members in the emergency department (ED). 174 family members of patients participated in this study. The age of family members was a mean of 43.1 (range: 20 to 84) years and 59.8% of them were women. The informations were obtained from a questionnaire filled out by the family members when they were waiting during examination and treatment of the patients. In this study, we divided the factors that influence the anxiety of family members into 4 categories; demographic factors, the family's individual factors, factors associated illness, and environmental factors in the ED. Multiple regression analysis with SPSS was used to identify the variables contributing to the variance in anxiety. We used the State Anxiety Inventory (S-STAI) to measure anxiety. As a result, 8 variables involving in severity of illness, situation in the emergency room, disagreement between perceived severity of illness and actual severity of illness, having symptoms of trauma, neurological, heart, and respiratory problems, waiting time, family needs, naturally anxious personality and a first visit patient were identified as significant predictors of anxiety. These variables accounted for 46.9% of total variance. These results suggest that nurses need more interaction with family members to reduce their anxiety.
