Emergency Care

Emergency Care

Article: Emergency and Critical Care

Publisher: BMJ Books

Name of Author: Ferdinand D' SouzaNumber of Pages: 176Published: 2010-11-20

Introduction

Registered nurses working in emmergency care areas are anticipated to be competent in identifying and managing cardiac arrests because they have a key role in starting and providing advanced life support (ALS). Indeed, some emmergency care educated nurses address their proficiency to identify cardiac arrests and respond in a timely and proficient manner to be a point of difference between specialist emmergency care nurses and generalist nurses. Initial education about ALS is provided throughout emmergency care courses. Recognising that ALS knowledge and skills breakdown over time in nurses and other wellbeing professionals, some nurses join ALS education meetings undertook by professional bodies, or educators in hospitals. However, anecdotal evidence proposes that the mandatory yearly competency assessments are being utilised to sustain and work out the keeping of ALS knowledge and skills. These ALS competency assessments routinely use scenarios that need nurses to illustrate resuscitation methods and verbalise conclusions and theoretical knowledge. Yet, there is little evidence to propose yearly competency assessments in periods of method and timing are an productive entails of double-checking nurses keep ALS knowledge and skills. Moreover, we have little comprehending of how ALS assessments are actually conducted. This article also critique the methods utilised to assess ALS skills and knowledge for nurses in U.K intensive care units (Alspach, 2010, pp.12).

Review

The assessment of this article should involve demonstration of a 'combination of skills, knowledge, attitudes, values and abilities that underpin effective and/or superior performance in a profession/occupational area'. Hence, cognitive knowledge, for example decision making strategies and psychomotor skills should be encompassed in the assessment of competence. In supplement scenarios are a useful method of assessing psychomotor skills. Knowledge and skills routinely assessed to illustrate ALS competence encompass arrhythmia recognition, defibrillation, insertion of intravenous cannula, management of first-line pharmacological agents, advanced airway management, post-arrest management and transport of a patient. ALS competency assessments are based on U.K Resuscitation Council guidelines, which, in turn, are acquainted by Advisory Statements in relative to Education in Resuscitation published by the International Liaison Committee on Resuscitation (ILCOR) in 2003. Although there is a recommendation for validated in writing tests for assessing wellbeing professionals' knowledge considering ALS, actual content and number and kind of inquiries for addition in assessments stay unclear (Hamilton, 2011, pp.291).

There is little guidance for nurse educators considering timing of competency assessments and/or the frequency of ongoing assessments for working out knowledge and ability retention. A recommendation exists for ALS assessments directly after and inside 6 months of education, most likely to assess acquisition of initial ALS knowledge and skill. By compare, there are inconsistent recommendations published by the ILCOR and the Resuscitation Council for assessing keeping of ALS knowledge and skills. Prior to February 2007, recommendations for frequency of competency assessment diverse between regular 6-monthly and annual assessment.

Given the significance of emmergency care nurse's abilities to resuscitate patients, retention of such knowledge and skills is ...