Nurses´ Knowledge, Attitudes and Practices Towards Prevention of Pressure Ulcers at Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Center

- Pressure ulcer (PU) is a preventable medical complication of immobility. It has psychological, economic and social impact on individual and family. Globally, studies show that nearly 700,000 patients are affected by pressure ulcers each year. Around 186,617 patients develop a new pressure ulcer in acute care each year. Pressure ulcers are accountable for 2% of preventable deaths. Although PU prevention remains a concern for all healthcare practitioners, maintenance of skin integrity and PU prevention is primarily role of nurses. The study objective as to assess the knowledge, attitudes and practices towards prevention of PU among nurses working at KCMC. The study was a hospital based descriptive cross section study, conducted in August 2020. The study population involved employed nurses at KCMC hospital available during the study period and who meet the inclusion criteria. The sample size consisted of all 141 nurses caring for patients with or at risk of PU and who were willing to participate in the study. Data were analyzed using SPSS (version 20). Frequencies, means, and standard deviations were used to summarize socio-demographic characteristics and to determine mean scores of knowledge, attitudes and practices among participants. A p-value of 0.05 was considered as significant. The study finds that the majority of nurses 106 (75.2%) had low level of knowledge (≤ 69%). Also nurses 87 (61.7%) in this study exhibited positive attitude towards PU prevention. Nearly half (45.4%) of nurses had moderate level of practice towards PU prevention. Knowledge of the nurses regarding prevention of PU was low. The majority of nurses had a positive attitude toward PU prevention. Majority of nurses had moderate practice towards prevention of PU. A non-negligible proportion of nurses had low level of practice towards prevention of PU. Its recommended that continuing professional development can be used to raise nurses' knowledge scores and their use of PU preventative practices