Cardiopulmonary resuscitation skills in some Nigerian secondary school students

Abstract

Background: While many countries of the world have incorporated the teaching of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) into their schools curricula, there has been little or no effort made towards this in Nigeria. The aim of this study was to find out whether exposure of some Nigerian secondary school children to the conventional CPR would result in significant change in their CPR skills immediately after the training. Methods: It was a quasi-experimental study design carried out in 2012 with participants drawn from both private and public secondary schools in Obio / Akpor Local Government Area in Port Harcourt City, Rivers State, Nigeria. The initial cohort (stage I) involved 400 participants from senior secondary school 1 and 2 (SS1) and SS2) when their baseline CPR skills were assessed and immediately after the CPR training (stage II) when the participants dropped to 347 [189 (54.5%) females; 158 (45.5%) males]. They were exposed to both class room teachings and the practical hands-on sessions using manikins in line with the American Heart Association (AHA) guidelines. The data was analyzed using ANOVA and t-test. Results: Although the participants had virtually no CPR skills at the beginning, they gained very substantially immediately after the training which was found statistically significant (P Conclusions: The CPR skills of the Nigerian students improved statistically with many ready to offer bystander CPR. It was recommended that CPR training programme should be incorporated into the curriculum of secondary school education in Nigeria.