Implementation of an informational card to reduce family members' anxiety.

For surgical patients' family members, the wait during surgery can cause anxiety that can be exacerbated if staff members provide inadequate or inconsistent information about the patient's status. Educational interventions and other staff-intensive measures to help reduce family members' anxiety can be time consuming for staff members and impractical in a high-volume facility. To improve communication with patients' families, nurses at a heart and vascular hospital in Dallas, Texas, designed and distributed a card containing estimated procedure times, helpful telephone numbers, and other information. A survey of family members indicated that receiving the card reduced anxiety in a significant proportion of the respondents.