Training Needs Assessment of Emergency Nurses Regarding the use of Mechanical Ventilation

The way that the nurses working in Emergency Departments (ED) encounter the patients under mechanical ventilator is different and their knowledge is limited in this field. Therefore the present study aims to determine the training needs of nurses related to the utilization of mechanical ventilators.

In this descriptive study, 98 nurses working at emergency departments of top rated hospitals of Iran University of Medical Sciences filled the questionaire. This researcher designed questionaire included demographic data, evaluation of knowledge in the format of scenario, evaluation of attitude and a paper of skill checklist , were used after validity and reliability confirmation. Analysis of data were done by SPSS version 22 and parameteric and non-parameteric tests.

Most of the nurses participanting in this study were female (86.7%) and in the age group of 25 to 35 years. Among them, 74.5% of ED nurses had work experience less than 1 year in the Intencive Care Unit (ICU), and 51% hadn’t passed ED nusing course. The most training need in the area of knowledge included patients intubation; in the area of skill included setting the ventilator’s parameters and in the area of attitude included fear of taking care of patients under ventilator.

According to the results of need assessment, it is mandetory to pay attention to the problems and demands of nursing in their educational programming. In order to meet profesional needs, short daily educational courses should be held and practical and skill aspects should be considered in training nurses.