Effect of Instructional Guideline on Nurses' Performance Regarding Weaning of Patients from Mechanical Ventilation

Background: Weaning a patient from mechanical ventilation (MV) and eventually to extubation is
a challenge for critical care nurses who play a vital role in assessing a patient’s readiness for
weaning. Aim: Evaluate the effect of instructional guideline on nurses' performance regarding
weaning of patients from MV. Hypothesis: The implementation of instructional guideline will have
a positive effect on nurses' performance through improvement of nurses' knowledge and practice
regarding weaning of patients from MV. Design: A quasi-experimental design was utilized to
conduct this study. Setting: The study was conducted at the Intensive care units in Ain Shams
University Hospital. Subjects: A Convenient sample of all available (40) nurses who working at the
previously mentioned setting. Tools: Two tools were used for data collection I. Nurses' Self-
administered Questionnaire: It included two parts: Part 1: Nurses' demographic characteristics, Part
2: Nurses' knowledge regarding weaning of patients from MV. II. Nurses' practice observational
checklists to assess level of nurses' practice regarding weaning of patients from MV. Results: the
mean age for nurses under study was 30.9±8.8, 47.5% of them were within the age group between 25
to ≤35 years. 62.5% of the nurses were female, 65% were married. 42.5% of the nurses were had
diploma nursing. There was a positive correlation with highly statistically significant relation
between the total score of nurses' knowledge and practice with marked improvement after
implementation of instructional guideline about weaning of patients from MV. Conclusion: there
was a statistically significant improvement after instructional guidelines implementation regarding
nurses' performance related to weaning of patients on ventilators. Recommendation: Critical care
units in hospitals should be equipped by Arabic instructional guideline for nurses' performance
weaning for patients on ventilators to improve the quality of patient’s care and decrease the
complications for this patient