Purpose
This study was done to identify the level of adjustment to hospital life, hospitalization recognition and hospital-related fear by school-aged children, and investigate the influence of hospitalization recognition and hospital-related fear on the hospital life of these children.
Methods
Participants were 112 three to six grade students who were hospitalized from 3 to 7 days at one of two children’s hospital. Date were collected from September 2015 to March 2016. Data were analyzed using frequency, percentage, mean, standard deviation, multiple regression.
Results
The mean score for adjustment to hospital life was 3.43±0.40 of 5, for hospitalization recognition, 2.98±0.46 of 4 and for hospital-related fear, 1.37±0.28 of 3. Factors affecting adjustment to hospital life were hospital-related fear (β=-.28, p=.002) and hospitalization recognition (β=.27, p=.003). These factors explained 17% of the variance in adjustment to hospital life.
Conclusion
Results indicate that adjustment to hospital life by school-aged children is not sufficient enough for them to cope with illnesses and hospitalization. Therefore, to improve adjustment to hospital life by school-aged children, nursing interventions that focus on increasing hospitalization recognition and decreasing hospital-related fear need to be developed.

Citations

• Quality of pediatric nursing care is effective in reducing fears of nursing interventions and materials used in hospitalized children: Results of a clinic-based study
  Nimet Karataş, Meltem Gürcan, Ayla Kaya, Zahide Iyi Altinişik, Ayşegül Işler
  Journal of Pediatric Nursing.2025; 84: 8.     CrossRef
• Impact of Coinsurance Reduction Policy on Healthcare Utilization Among Children Under 15
  Minah Park, Eun-Cheol Park, Hongin Noh, Sung-In Jang
  Journal of Korean Medical Science.2023;[Epub]     CrossRef
• Developing Patient’s Context Based Improvement Scenarios and Design Proposals to Enhance the Child-Friendliness of Hospitals
  Jae-Won Hwang, Geon-Dong Kim
  Journal of Digital Contents Society.2023; 24(11): 2627.     CrossRef
• A Survey of Nurses' Need for Care Robots in Children's Hospitals
  Meiling Jin, Jeongeun Kim
  CIN: Computers, Informatics, Nursing.2020; 38(7): 349.     CrossRef