The Effect of Evidence-Based Nursing Education on knowledge of Intensive Care Unit Nurses in Hospitals of Armed Forces

Applying evidence-based care is essential to improve the skills of nurses working in intensive care units (ICUs). Nurses should know more about recent research evidences and put them into practice.
This study aimed at assessing the effects of an evidence-based nursing education on knowledge of ICU nurses working in the hospitals of armed forces.
In this quasi-experimental study, two hospitals affiliated to the armed forces were selected purposively in 2016. Ninety ICU nurses were selected from the two hospitals using the convenience sampling method and divided into two equal groups of experimental and control (n=45). In the experimental group, a two-day workshop was held to provide theoretical and practical interventions and the control group received no intervention. Data collection in both groups before and after the test was performed using a valid and reliable questionnaire. The data were analyzed using Kolmogorov-Smirnov, chi-square, independent t-test, Fisher’s exact test and descriptive statistics with the SPSS software version 19.
Results showed that the mean score of knowledge of the ICU nurses before the intervention in the case group was 11.2± 3.6 and in the control group was 11.3 ± 5.1 (P =0.943). After the intervention, the mean score of knowledge was 21.02 ± 2.3 in the experimental group and 11.4 ± 5.1 in the control group. Also, the results of an Independent t-test showed a statistically significant difference in the level of knowledge between the two groups (P =0.0001).
Discussion and Due to the positive impact of evidence-based nursing education on knowledge of the ICU nurses, training the nurses in theoretical and practical forms (training workshop) regarding the concepts of evidence-based practice is recommended.