Although there are many aspects of a psychological preparation program, not all patients will need every component. A complete program can be helpful throughout the entire back surgery process, from gathering information according to one's personal coping style to getting adequate pain control and helping ensure an appropriate level of assertiveness with medical staff. A longstanding theory is that the more information a person has about the procedure and recovery, the better he or she will do postoperatively. Although the positive benefits of providing information to surgery patients have been established in many studies, these results are tempered by other findings.
People show differences in how they best manage information about stressful events such as surgery.
The more information you are given, the better you will do. If you are not given enough information, then you tend to show increased anxiety due to not feeling in control. In the face of the stress, you may actually do worse if you are given an overwhelming amount of information. For blunters, a great deal of information results in more pre-operative anxiety and can correlate with worse outcomes. Thus, some level of denial and distraction may work best for blunters.