A study to assess the factor influencing pre hospital delay in seeking medical treatment among clients with myocardial infarction admitted in selected hospitals of amritsar.

Abstract

Introduction: Myocardial infarction is the leading cause of death in older adult, accounting for approximately 40% of deaths. An acute myocardial infarction is a serious, life-threatening medical event which occurs when the coronary blood flow is obstructed, usually from a blood clot, resulting in ischemia to the myocardial tissue. Pre-hospital delay is critical for patient survival in myocardial infarction; administration of reperfusion agents is associated with a reduction of up to 25% in in-hospital mortality after acute myocardial infarction. Objectives: To assess the factor influencing pre-hospital delay seeking medical treatment among clients with myocardial infarction. To determine the barrier that hinder early seeking of medical care among myocardial infarction patients. To determine the barrier that hinder early seeking of medical care among myocardial infarction patients. Methods: In this study, quantitative research approach used. The research design adopted in this study was non-experimental descriptive research design. The study was conducted at The Corporate hospital Amritsar, Punjab. A total of 100 samples were selected by convenient sampling technique. Checklist was used as research tool. This tool was consisted two parts such as demographic variables and checklist. Data was analyzed by descriptive and inferential statistics. Result: The study findings show that there is significant association with demographic variables such as age, marital status and income at 0.05 level of significance. There is highly significant association between pre-hospital delay seeking medical treatment among myocardial infarction with demographic variables as calculated values with age = 10.92, with marital status = 6.81, with income = 12.82. Whereas demographic variables education and occupation shows no association with pre-hospital delay seeking medical treatment among myocardial infarction. Conclusion: This study draws a conclusion that the less knowledge about AMI reduced symptom perception and perceived seriousness respectively were also the factors related to treatment seeking delay among patients with AMI. This study showed that the inadequate family support, non-family support and social support were also the factors related to treatment seeking delay among patients with AMI. This study concludes that the decreased pain level, absence of chest pain and presence of chest pain alone were the factors related to treatment seeking delay among patients with AMI.