The effect of multimedia information on anxiety levels of patients undergoing magnetic resonance imaging

Purpose: magnetic resonance imaging (mri) has been the most important and rapidly developing diagnostic tool in all spheres of medicine. however studies recently reported that severe anxiety and fear occurs in 37% of patients who underwent mri. in our study, we aimed to reduce patient anxiety by video information. materials and methods: between december 2015 and february 2016 using a 1.5 tesla mri machine, 100 patients were enrolled in the study. patients were divided into two groups; video information group (n = 50) and control group (n = 50). anxiety levels of the patients were determined by applying state-trait anxiety inventory (stai) and visual analogue scale (vas). a three-minute video, which was prepared earlier, was watched by the patients in video information group before mri. after video information, stai-s and vas were applied again. subsequent to mri, all patients were given a questionnaire consisting of seven questions and their responses were recorded. results: our research demonstrated no significant difference in anxiety scores of both groups before mri. in the video information group there was a significant reduction in vas and stai-s scores (p = 0.002) after video information. according to the survey after mri; in the video information group, concerns about mri duration was significantly lower (p = 0.016) than the patients in the control group and that procedure was better than they expected before (p = 0.022). conclusion: this inexpensive and harmless method was successful in reducing patient anxiety in mri applications.