Association between symptom experiences with bio-physiological parameters of haemodialysis patients during AV-fistula cannulation

Background: Haemodialysis patients usually have symptoms of either mentally or physically experienced before or during or after their procedure. This study evaluates the frequency of experienced symptoms, negatively effect of functioning, regardless of acuity, and well-being can be measured in terms of bio physiological parameters as BP, Pulse rate, Respiratory rate and SpO2. Methods: In this study convenience sampling technique was used to correlate the symptom experiences and bio-physiological parameters of 200 hemodialysis patients using one to one interview with the set of framed symptoms. Results: During AV Fistula cannulation, the major symptoms seen were fear, anxiety, irritation, anger and sadness. The main physical symptom experiences by HD patients was pain, drowsiness, fatigue, headache, palpitations, numbness, nausea/vomiting and, breathlessness. There was increase in pulse rate, blood pressure, heart rate, and decrease in the respiratory rate in majority of patients. The most relevant and highly significant were pulse rate due to fear and irritation and increase in hear rate and respiration due to pain and breathlessness. Conclusion: This study suggests that nursing and physicians’ team should consider reducing problems of haemodialysis patients by training and counselling. More is warranted to improve the quality of life which can be resulted from exercise counselling and encouragement in hemodialysis patients. *Correspondence to: R Revathi, MSc (N), PhD, Assistant Professor, Faculty of Nursing, Sri Ramachandra Institute of Higher Education and Research, Porur, Chennai-600116, India, E-mail: revathisriraghu@yahoo.co.in