Knowledge and practice of staff nurses on prevention of pressure ulcers in a selected hospital, Kottayam

The present study was conducted to assess the knowledge and practice of staff nurses on prevention of pressure ulcers. The objectives of the study were to assess the knowledge of staff nurses on prevention of pressure ulcers, to assess the practice of staff nurses on prevention of pressure ulcers, to determine the correlation between knowledge and practice of staff nurses on prevention of pressure ulcers, to find out the association between knowledge and practice of staff nurses on prevention of pressure ulcers and selected demographic variables. The sample consisted of 60 registered nurses who were working in medical and surgical wards of Caritas Hospital, recruited by purposive sampling technique. The design used was descriptive research design with quantitative approach. The tools used were Structured Questionnaire on socio demographic variables, structured knowledge questionnaire on prevention of pressure ulcers and observation check list to assess the practice on prevention of pressure ulcers. The data was collected by self-report and observation. The data was analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics. The study revealed that 43% of nurses had good knowledge about prevention of pressure ulcers and 30% nurses had good practice on prevention of pressure ulcers. The study also showed that there was no correlation (r =0.132) between knowledge and practice of staff nurses regarding prevention of pressure ulcers. The study finding showed that there was no significant association between knowledge and practice of staff nurses on prevention of pressure ulcers with selected demographic variables like educational status and current area of work (chi square significance <0.05).