Preoperative anxiety appears to be driven more by patient demographics and coping styles (e.g., female sex, presence of a support person) than by medical factors like the extent of surgery or previous surgical experience.
Most surgical and anesthesia personnel assume that certain factors lead to increased preoperative anxiety, yet the predictability of preoperative anxiety has not been extensively studied. We hypothesized that surgical and anesthesia personnel could be more effective in reducing preoperative anxiety if potential predictors of presurgical anxiety were identified. A sample of 523 patients awaiting elective surgery completed an anxiety scale, had their blood pressure and pulse measured, and had 14 different characteristics recorded. These characteristics included demographics, possibility of cancer, presence of support person, previous surgical experience, and extent of surgery. Female patients were more anxious than male patients, and individuals accompanied by a support person were more anxious than those not accompanied. However, all other factors were noncontributory to anxiety. It appears that patient anxiety does not reflect the assumptions of surgical and anesthesia personnel. This suggests that preoperative anxiety may reflect a patient's personality and coping style more than medical data.
Domar et al. (1989) studied this question.