A Quasi- Experimental Study to assess the Effectiveness of Psycho Education on knowledge regarding Psychological First Aid Among Staff Nurses in SDM Hospital at Dharwad.

INTRODUCTION

Staff nurses are in unique position to monitor a patient’s psychological coping and any distress. Psychosocial care is the part of holistic patient prospective and allows patients to seek both informational and emotional support from the care givers to help them manage their crisis situation¹ . Nursing professionals represent one of those overlooked resources. As with all professional disciplines which will respond to psychological needs post disaster, some form of specialized training is essential² . Psychological First Aid training can provide the fundamental tools needed to functionally prepare nurses, as well as other occupational groups. As nurses are already integrated into the provision of other post-disaster services, they can serve as a surveillance system and first-line response to attend to psychological emergencies- with the subsequent capability of triaging to the next level of care, consistent with traditional medical models of the continuum of care. Nurses can provide services to both primary survivors and other responders³ .

NEED FOR THE STUDY: To increase basic psychological and mental health first aid to prevent their health from deteriorating and to empower them to take action to improve their mental health. Providing more peoples with psychological and mental health first aid skills will helps to decrease the rate of suicide & health problems⁴ .

OBJECTIVES:

• o assess the pre test knowledge of staff nurses regarding psychological first aid ..

• To determine the effectiveness of knowledge regarding psychological First aid among staff nurses .

• To find out the association between post test knowledge regarding psychological First aid among staff nurses with their selected personal variables.

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY:

• RESEARCH APPROACH AND DESIGN : Quantitative approach , Pre experimental one group pretest post test research design

• RESEARCH SETTING : SDM hospital Dharwad

• SAMPLE: Staff nurses working in general wards of SDM hospital Dharwad.

• SAMPLE SIZE: The sample size was 60 staff nurses working in SDMCMS & H Dharwad.

• SAMPLING TECHNIQUE : Non probability convenient sampling technique.

• VARIABLES: Independent Variable: Psycho-education regarding Psychological First Aid.

• DEPENDENT VARIABLE: Knowledge of staff nurses regarding Psychological First Aid.

• ASSUMPTIONS: Assumptions of the study are

• Staff nurses have some knowledge regarding psychological first aid.

• Psycho-education may have a positive influence on knowledge of staff nurses regarding Psychological First Aid.

• DELIMITATIONS: A study is delimited to Staff nurses working in SDM hospital and who are registered in KNC.

CRITERIA FOR SELECTING THE SAMPLE:

Inclusive criteria

• Staff nurses working in SDMCMS&H.

• Available at the time of data collection.

• Willing to participate in the study.

• Registered in the state Nursing Council.

Exclusive criteria

• Leave at the time of data collection.

• Are severely ill at the time of data collection.

METHODS OF DATA COLLECTION:

• Formal permission obtained from the concerned authority.

• The purpose of the study was explained and informed written consent was taken from staff nurses.

• Pre test was done on first day & psycho education regarding psychological first aid was given on the same day.

• Post test was conducted on the 7th day, to evaluate the effectiveness of psycho education regarding psychological first aid.

• The data was collected on the basis of the objectives and hypothesis formulated for the study.

TOOLS USED:

SECTION – A : It consists of socio demographic data with 5 items

SECTION – B : This part consists of structured multiple choice questionnaires to assess the knowledge of staff nurses regarding psychological first aid.

VALIDITY:

Structured multiple choice questionnaires to assess the knowledge of staff nurses regarding psychological first aid education. Content validated by seven experts such as Doctors, Nursing educators, psychologist, social worker there was 100% agreement by all experts.

RELIABILITY:

The structured knowledge questionnaires was used and reliability of the tool was checked by the test retest method , the reliability of the tool was found to be 0.8.

RESULTS :

The pre test mean score of staff nurses was 9.26 with Standard deviation of ±1.91 median of 10. The post test mean score of staff nurses was 18.13 with Standard deviation of ±1.58 median of 18.

Structured knowledge questionnaires of psychological first day scores of post test which is apparently higher than pre test knowledge .

Section- IV: Comparision of pre and post test knowledge of psychological first aid among staff nurses.

The calculated value paired t=27.85 was higher than the table value is p=0.68 at 0.05 level. Thus psycho education on knowledge regarding psychological first aid among staff nurses was effective in post test.

Section - V : Association of post test knowledge with socio demographic variables.

Chi- square value is significant for variable like age and source of information. And gender, religion, income were not significant at 0.05 level.

DISCUSSION:

Section- 1: Demographic variables of staff nurses

Section – II: Analysis of pre and post test

Majority 44(73.4%) staff nurses in pre test had moderate inadequate knowledge regarding psychological first aid. Maximum 50(83.4%) staff nurses in post test had adequate knowledge regarding psychological first aid.

CONCLUSION

Psycho education had a definite impact on the knowledge of staff nurses regarding psychological first aid. In the post test majority of staff nurses had adequate knowledge regarding psychological first aid .