Telephone follow-up of the elderly after cataract surgery

Abstract

Study’s purpose:To analyze the effectiveness of telephone intervention for the nursing diagnosis of delayed surgical recovery in older persons who have undergone cataract surgery.Design:Blinded, randomized, and controlled trial. A total of 95 patients of both sexes who were over 60 years old and had undergone cataract surgery were divided into an intervention group (48 patients) and a control group (47 patients), allocated using BioEstat 5.3 Software.Results:The intervention included postoperative follow-up recovery of cataracts and prevention of complications performed on the 1st, 4th, 10th, and 20th postoperative days. After the intervention, the intervention group had a decrease in the length of surgical recovery ( p = .000). The occurrence in the intervention group was 6.3%, while in the control group, it was 36.2% (odds ratio (OR) = 0.118; confidence interval (CI) = 1.02, 10.23). The number of nursing interventions nevertheless decreased during the telephone follow-up.Conclusion:For older persons, the telephone guidelines increase adherence to treatment, promote clinical improvement, promote surgical recovery over time, and improve independence and autonomy.