BACKGROUND: Cardiac arrest (CA) is a leading cause of death worldwide. The European Resuscitation Council (ERC) has developed basic life support/automated external defibrillation (BLS/AED) courses for uniform training in out-of-hospital CA. OBJECTIVE: The present study compares the resuscitation skills of two groups of nursing staff, one taught by newly trained ERC nurse-instructors and the other by newly trained doctor-instructors. METHOD:Eighteen doctors and 18 nurses were asked to teach a total of 108 nurses in a (BLS/AED) course. One month after its completion, all 108 nurses were asked to be re-evaluated, with the use of the objective structured clinical examination. CONCLUSIONS: No statistical significant difference between the two groups was noted in the written test, in contrast with data collected from the practice skills check-list. Nurses in group A could easily identify the patient in cardiac arrest but had difficulties concerning chest compressions and handling the AED. Nurses in group B were more focused during the performances, used AED more accurately and continued cardiopulmonary resuscitation with no delays. Nurses prove to be more efficient in training nurses.
RCT Entities:
BACKGROUND:Cardiac arrest (CA) is a leading cause of death worldwide. The European Resuscitation Council (ERC) has developed basic life support/automated external defibrillation (BLS/AED) courses for uniform training in out-of-hospital CA. OBJECTIVE: The present study compares the resuscitation skills of two groups of nursing staff, one taught by newly trained ERC nurse-instructors and the other by newly trained doctor-instructors. METHOD: Eighteen doctors and 18 nurses were asked to teach a total of 108 nurses in a (BLS/AED) course. One month after its completion, all 108 nurses were asked to be re-evaluated, with the use of the objective structured clinical examination. CONCLUSIONS: No statistical significant difference between the two groups was noted in the written test, in contrast with data collected from the practice skills check-list. Nurses in group A could easily identify the patient in cardiac arrest but had difficulties concerning chest compressions and handling the AED. Nurses in group B were more focused during the performances, used AED more accurately and continued cardiopulmonary resuscitation with no delays. Nurses prove to be more efficient in training nurses.
Authors: Jasmeet Soar; Mary E Mancini; Farhan Bhanji; John E Billi; Jennifer Dennett; Judith Finn; Matthew Huei-Ming Ma; Gavin D Perkins; David L Rodgers; Mary Fran Hazinski; Ian Jacobs; Peter T Morley Journal: Resuscitation Date: 2010-10 Impact factor: 5.262