Anaesthetic nurses knowledge of commonly used drugs in four academic hospitals

Abstract

Lack of pharmacology knowledge among nurses can result in adverse events and medical errors which can have serious consequences for the patient. The South African Society of Anaesthesiologists (SASA) states that a trained anaesthetic assistant is necessary for the safe and efficient conduct of anaesthesia. Literature worldwide have shown that pharmacology knowledge of nurses is lacking. Knowledge of anaesthetic drugs used in theatre by anaesthetic nurses in the four academic hospitals affiliated to the University of the Witwatersrand is not known. The aim was of this study was to describe the knowledge of anaesthetic nurses working in four public academic hospitals in Johannesburg regarding selected drugs commonly administered during anaesthesia. The primary objectives of the study were to describe the knowledge of anaesthetic nurses regarding five drugs commonly administered during anaesthesia and to describe the sources used by nurses to obtain knowledge of drugs. The secondary objectives were to correlate the level of knowledge with years of nursing experience and to compare the level of knowledge with the nurse’s qualification. The study was descriptive, prospective and contextual.Thirty-six nurses took part in the study. A self administred questionnaire, with a demographic and knowledge section, was used to collect data. It was found that anaesthetic nurses had inadequate knowledge as only 36% of the participants passed, achieving a score of ≥ 80%.The most common source of knowledge was obtained from clinical experience.A weak negative correlation was found between the level of knowledge and years of anaesthetic experience (r=-0.1850). There was no statistical significance between level of knowledge and nursing qualification (p=0.999). It is of importance to note that the questionnaire was simple and practical, and if a more standardised questionnaire was used then an even lower pass rate would have been obtained. The study revealed that anaesthetic nurses lack adequate knowledge and are essentially functioning outside their scope of practice. The study highlights the need for an intervention to improve pharmacology knowledge of anaesthetic nurses in the Department of Anaesthesiology.