Original Research Article
Year: 2019 | Month: June | Volume: 6 | Issue: 6 | Pages: 42-49
Do Medical and Dental Students Have Adequate Knowledge in Basic Life Support?
Ishwinderjeet Kaur1, Hariz Idlan Kamarol Zaman2
1Faculty of Medicine (MBBS) Student, 2Faculty of Medicine (MBBS) Student,
Faculty of Medicine, Melaka-Manipal Medical College (Melaka Campus), Melaka, Malaysia.
Corresponding Author: Ishwinderjeet Kaur
ABSTRACT
Basic Life Support, though it appears to be a simple life-saving procedure, can be useless or fatal if performed wrongly. Our study was conducted to assess knowledge of basic life support and the factors influencing it among medical and dental students. Further, our study discusses the proposal for basic life support knowledge to be incorporated into the academic curriculum and therefore, making it a compulsory assessment prior to graduation for both medical and dental courses. A cross-sectional study was conducted whereby a questionnaire was distributed to 300 students at a private medical college. Excluding the incomplete response forms, the data of 280 responders was analyzed. Of these 280 students, 157 (56.07%) were medical students and 123 (43.93%) dental students. The results of the questionnaire were categorized as satisfactory (scored 11 to 20 marks out of 20) and unsatisfactory (scored 0 to 10 marks out of 20). It was found that only 106 (67.52%) medical students and 57 (46.34%) dental students scored satisfactory results. This highlighted the need to improve the knowledge of basic life support amongst these students, they are after all our aspiring healthcare professionals.
Key words: basic life support, knowledge, medical, dental, students
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