Investigation of constipation condition of surgical patients

Purpose: The study was planned to examine the constipation condition of surgical patients. Materials and methods: The universe of this descriptive study consisted of patients who underwent surgery between May 2016 - 2017 in a university hospital general surgery clinic. Patients (n=57) who were operated on this clinic at the specified dates and agreed to participate in the study constituted the sample of the study. A questionnaire about the identity information of the patients and Constipation Risk Assessment Scale are used collecting the data. A written permission was obtained from the Scientific Ethics Board and the institution where the study was conducted for the investigation to be carried out. The data was evaluated in numbers and percentage in SPSS 16.0 software package. Results: The mean age of the patients was 53.43±12.75 years and 63.2% of them were female. When the defecating of the patients was examined in accordance with the ROME III constipation diagnoses criteria, it was determined that the 24.6% of the patients had one, 15.8% of them had two and 7.0% of them had three of the criteria. The mean score of the Constipation Risk Assessment Scale of the patients was found to be 8.49 points. When the scale scores of the patients were examined, it was seen that 73.7% had <10 low risk, 19.3% 11-15 moderate risk and 7.0%>16 high risk group. Conclusions: Some of the patients were found to have constipation problems, and patients were also seen in the middle and high-risk groups according to the results of the risk assessment scale.