Perioperative anxiety is a common issue in perioperative environment. Numerous patients feels stress, anxiety or fear before a surgery or operation. Preoperative anxiety can cause changes in physical or psychical conditions, in rehabilitation or cause complications and troubles in anesthesia. Furthermore anxiety is in connection to the suffering experienced by patients and should therefore be minimized to guarantee high quality nursing care.

The idea of this Bachelor’s thesis came from Kanta-Hämeen keskussairaala. The aim of this thesis is to answer questions about what kind of anxiety or fear patient is feeling before surgery and which kind of nursing interventions there are to ease that anxiety. The methodology chosen for the thesis is descriptive literature review. The theory base of this thesis is obtained from literature of nursing and nursing science articles.

The conclusion of this thesis was that many patients feel anxiety during perioperative care. That is why it is important that perioperative practitioners are able to reduce that anxiety. The most common causes for fear were fear of losing control, fear of the unknown, surgery, anesthesia, pain and complications.

Nursing interventions include informing patients, providing mental or social support and a contact with a nurse or alternative methods like warming, music or touch. Individual care and taking the feelings of patients seriously are essential for perioperative nursing.