The Impact of Brief Text Messages on Critical Care Nurses’ Ability to Interpret Arrhythmia: A Randomized Controlled Trial
Mohannad Eid AbuRuz1, Fatma Refaat Ahmed2, 3, *
Article Information
Identifiers and Pagination:
Year: 2023Volume: 17
E-location ID: e187443462307070
Publisher ID: e187443462307070
DOI: 10.2174/18744346-v17-230720-2023-69
Article History:
Received Date: 30/04/2023Revision Received Date: 08/06/2023
Acceptance Date: 26/06/2023
Electronic publication date: 25/07/2023
Collection year: 2023
open-access license: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY 4.0), a copy of which is available at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode. This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Abstract
Background:
A lack of electrocardiogram (ECG) interpretation competency could threaten patient safety, and there is an urgent need to improve nurses’ abilities to identify life-threatening arrhythmias.
Aim:
To check the hypothesis that Coronary Care Units (CCUs) nurses who received Short Message Service (SMS) data concerning irregular cardiac rhythms can better interpret cardiac arrhythmias than the control group.
Methods:
WhatsApp messages were sent to the intervention group two times a week for 10 weeks. At the baseline line, the test was given to both groups, while reassessment was done on the same day as the last WhatsApp SMS.
Results:
The intervention score increased after receiving SMS messages compared to the control group (M[SD]; 16.60 ± 2.23 vs. 11.40 ± 3.10, t=10.40, p <0.001).
Implications for Nursing:
Text messaging is a cost-effective, time-saving, and practical tool of mobile learning and enhance nurses’ ECG interpretation skills.
Conclusion:
The study demonstrated that sending SMS messages using WhatsApp is practical and useful for improving nurses’ cardiac arrhythmia interpretation skills.
Clinical Trial Study Registration Number:
NCT 05419554