Effectiveness of information, education and communication on chemotherapy port upon the knowledge and practice of nurses

Cancer is still one of the leading causes of death. With ongoing developments in oncology, the survival of cancer patients is improving. Nurses are primarily responsible for ensuring that patients receive chemotherapy safely and providing the effective self-management support. Adequate Information, education and communication for nurses will enhance early recognition and response in preventing adverse events.

To assess the Effectiveness of Information, Education and Communication (IEC) on Chemotherapy Port upon the Knowledge and Practice of Nurses.

A Pre experimental one group pre-test and post-test design was adopted for this study, which included 70 nurses selected by purposive sampling technique. Data was collected by using the demographic variable proforma, structured knowledge questionnaire, practice of nurses was assessed by OSCE method using the observational checklist.

Majority of the nurses had moderately adequate knowledge (64.29%) and 28.58% of them had inadequate knowledge in pre-test. There was a significant improvement in post-test knowledge scores of nurses regarding chemotherapy port (M=23.27, SD =2.53) compared to the pre-test scores (M=15.17, SD=4.65) with the ‘t’ value of 51.00 at p<0.001. On other hand, majority of the nurses had poor practice scores in pre-test (78.57). There was a significant improvement in post-test practice scores of nurses regarding chemotherapy port (M=45.66, SD=4.16) compared to the pre-test scores (M= 18.84, SD=11.01) with ‘t’ value of 41.32 at p <0.001.

The present study reveals that information, education and communication can be used to nurses to improve the quality of care in care of chemotherapy port.