Assessment of the quality of life and educational needs in patients undergoing liver transplantation

Objectives: This study was planned as a descriptive study in order to determine the quality of life and education needs of patients who underwent liver transplantation and to develop suggestions for care and education. Material and method: The study was carried out with 93 patients who underwent liver transplantation in a private hospital near İstanbul province of Europe. The data were gathered by the questionnaire form after the approval of the institution and the ethics committee. Patient Information Form and Nottingham Health Profile with Energy Level (EL), Onel Reaction (ER), Pain (P), Social Insulation (SI), Physical Activity (PA) and Sleep (S) subscales were used to collect the data. SPSS 21.0 program was used for data analysis. Results: According to the results of the research; the majority of the patients were male, the vast majority were married and primary school graduates. The majority of patients were found to be viral hepatitis due to illness and the majority of the donor type were alive. It was determined that the Turkish version of NSP scale was a valid and reliable instrument for measuring the quality of life of patients with liver transplantation. When the NSP scores were compared according to the educational levels of the patients, the only difference between the Energy Level subscale scores was statistically significant (p<0,05). According to the NSP, it was determined that the patients who did not know how to protect themselves from infection after transplantation had a significantly higher level of Energy, pain, emotional recation, physical activity subscales and NSP total scores than the patients who knew how to protect themselves from the infection. It was found that the vast majority of the sample was informed about how to use post-operative drugs. Recommendations were made on the training process and methods of drug use and prevention of infections.