The Effect of Respiratory Exercise After Laparoscopic Surgery

Surgical intervention is a form of treatment applied to preserve the physiology of the organism as much as possible, and to normalize the body functions that are impaired in diseases and injuries.

Laparoscopic surgery (LC) enables the patient to experience the desired result more aesthetically, stress-free and less painful with smaller incisions in the postoperative period. This increases patient satisfaction and reduces morbidity and mortality.

It is made with small incisions without exposing large tissues, which is inevitable in LC surgery. Less tissue dissection provides a lower level of neuroendocrine and metabolic response to stress in humans. Postoperative pain and need for analgesia are reduced. It accelerates the recovery process of the patient and helps him return to daily life in a shorter time. It reduces the patient's hospital stay. It increases comfort and quality of life, provides less suppression of the immune system.

LC has a lower mortality rate in addition to reducing the incidence of complications such as cosmetic problems, bleeding, injury, infection, inflammation, ileus. All these make LC more advantageous than other surgical methods. Pain, anxiety, nausea and vomiting are among the most common complications in the early postoperative period. In addition to pharmacological methods, non-pharmacological methods are also used to eliminate complications. Breathing exercise, which is the first step of relaxation, is one of the frequently used non-pharmacological methods.

With breathing exercises, it is ensured that the respiratory rate and depth are regulated, the muscles of the assisted respiration relax, and the efficiency of respiration is increased. The most commonly used breathing exercises are pursed lip breathing (pursed lip breathing) and diaphragmatic breathing. Nurses should explain the steps of the procedure in the exercise applications in a way that the patient can understand and ensure that they practice the exercises regularly.

Preoperative patient education, which can help prevent post-operative problems and early recovery; with explanation of surgical procedures, deep breathing, coughing, leg exercises, turning in bed, mobilization and reducing pain etc. includes topics. Among the duties and responsibilities of nurses working in surgical clinics are to provide breathing exercise training to patients in the preoperative period and to ensure its implementation in the postoperative period.

Post-operative patients are not ready to learn anything new due to pain and other reasons. Therefore, these trainings should be completed before the surgery. The purpose of giving deep breathing and coughing exercises; Expanding the decreased lung capacity during and after anesthesia, restoring the perfusion-ventilation balance and regulating its distribution, increasing oxygenation, protecting the airways, and enabling the secretions in the airways to be expelled more easily with effective coughing.

Teaching the breathing exercises, which is one of the basic duties of the surgical nurse, to the patients, explaining the importance of this and having it done regularly, increases the oxygenation of the tissues and affects the healing quality positively. In the literature, it has been stated that respiratory exercises reduce the level of anxiety and increase the quality of sleep and recovery in different patient groups in the postoperative period.

Nurses should take an active role in diagnosing nausea, vomiting, pain and respiratory problems that may occur in the postoperative period, planning and applying the necessary pharmacological and non-pharmacological methods, monitoring and evaluating the results of treatment, and should be able to prevent problems that may develop.

This study was planned to determine the effect of respiratory exercises on postoperative pain, anxiety, nausea-vomiting and respiratory parameters after laparoscopic surgery.