Cardiopulmonary resuscitation skills retention in family members of cardiac patients.

The purpose of this study was to determine if the use of a retention strategy would maintain cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) skills in family members of cardiac patients. Thirty-one subjects trained in CPR received retention packets 3 and 6 months after CPR training. Sixteen subjects were tested for CPR retention at 7 months after initial training, and 15 at 12 months. Likelihood chi 2 was used to compare the 7- and 12-month groups. There were no differences between the 7- and 12-month groups, because CPR retention overall was poor. Only 19.4% of subjects reported using the retention packet; therefore, subjects were regrouped into practice and no practice groups for purposes of further statistical analysis. There were significant differences in retention in subjects who practiced compared with subjects who did not. These findings underscore the importance of promoting practice/review after initial CPR training for family members of cardiac patients.