The Experience of Open Heart Surgery

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Abstract
In this report we focus on 11 items used by nurses in rating behavior in the three-week period following cardiac surgery and correlate these with data collected pre-operatively in terms of adaptation, extent of illness, and psychological tests, operative, and post-operative factors. Those patients, who showed greater pre-operative adaptation, were less ill, scored lower on emotional distress, had fewer complications at operation, and a more benign post-operative course, showed less behavioral disturbance. These results serve to emphasize the complex interrelationships between neurological and psychological variables in determining behavior and are reminiscent of much of the work done by Kurt Goldstein with patients who had chronic organic brain syndromes [15].

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