To analyze the effect of holistic nursing intervention on the postoperative recovery of elderly patients with inguinal hernia.

Clinical data of 64 patients with inguinal hernia admitted to Linquan County People's Hospital from June 2021 to June 2024 were selected. According to the admission time and voluntary principle, patients were randomly divided into a control group and an experimental group in a 1:1 ratio, with 32 cases in each group. The control group received routine perioperative care; The experimental group received holistic nursing intervention. The pain level of patients was evaluated using the pain numeric score (NRS) method, and the presence of deep vein thrombosis after surgery was observed. The Barthel index was used to assess the patient's postoperative self-care ability. The NRS scores, postoperative self-care ability and hospitalization time between two groups were compared.

The experimental group had 22 cases (68.75%), 7 cases (21.87%), 3 cases (9.37%), and 0 cases (0.00%) of postoperative 0, 1-3、4-6、7-10 pointspain, respectively. The control group had 13 cases (40.62%), 11 cases (34.37%), 6 cases (18.75%), and 6 cases (18.75%), respectively. The pain level in the experimental group was significantly milder than that in the control group, and the difference was statistically significant (P<0.05). Both groups of patients had no postoperative deep vein thrombosis. There was no statistically significant difference in preoperative self-care ability scores between the two groups of patients (P>0.05). On the day of surgery and the second day after surgery, the self-care ability of the experimental group was significantly higher than that of the control group, and the difference was statistically significant (P<0.05). The hospitalization time was less than that of the control group, and the difference was statistically significant (P<0.05).

Holistic nursing intervention can effectively improve postoperative pain in elderly patients with inguinal hernia, promote rapid recovery of self-care ability, and is worthy of clinical promotion.