Saudi Critical Care Journal

Export selected to

Endnote

Reference Manager

Procite

Medlars Format

RefWorks Format

BibTex Format

Objective: Failure of health-care providers to have sufficient knowledge and prevention measures of gestational hypertension leads to an increased rate of complications during pregnancy that may lead to the loss of the fetus. The study aims to determine the level of the nurses' knowledge working in primary health-care (PHC) centers regarding gestational hypertension disorders in Riyadh city. Subjects and Methods: A descriptive correlational, nonexperimental study design was conducted at 6 PHC centers using a self-administered questionnaire for nurses (n = 257). Results: Nurses had inadequate knowledge about the essential key items of gestational hypertension disorders. Almost half of the nurses (44%) lacked knowledge about how to assess the fetal condition in case of gestational hypertension, and 57.98% of the sample had difficulty in identifying the signs and symptoms of mild preeclampsia. The majority of the sample (70.42%) had unsatisfactory knowledge about essential drugs for the treatment of preeclampsia; 54.08% of the nurses experienced insufficient knowledge about their role before the administration of magnesium sulfate drugs. In addition, study results show that there was a lack of knowledge on the appropriate management of preeclampsia among the majority study participants (98.83%) with a total knowledge mean score (19.09, 63.63%). Conclusion: Primary care nurses lacked the needed knowledge to identify and provide preventive care to women experiencing gestational hypertension. Furthermore, there was a lack of knowledge in regard to identifying the complications of preeclampsia. The nurses are accountable for the quality of maternity care, and a maternity training program must be considered.

Background and purpose: Antibiotic misuse in Saudi Arabia is becoming an increasing concern. It leads to the development and acceleration of antibiotic resistance. One of the established approaches to tackle the problem is through improving public awareness of appropriate antibiotic use. This study examined the level of awareness of university students about the correct use of antibiotics and the issue of antibiotic resistance. Methods: A cross-sectional study was designed, using a self-administered online questionnaire that was sent to all students of Prince Mohammad Bin Fahd University in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia. Results: The total number of participants was 320 students, of whom 210 were female (65.6%) and 110 were male (34.4%). About a third (34.7%) of the students had poor knowledge regarding the fact that antibiotics should only be used for bacterial infections. In addition, just over half (50.0%–57.5%) of the students could not classify the common viral infections as antibiotic untreatable infections. On the other hand, the majority (84.1%) of the respondents were highly aware of the correct source and the correct use of antibiotic prescriptions. Similarly, 73.4% of students revealed a high awareness level of how to address the issue of antibiotic resistance. However, around one-third (35.3%) of them incorrectly thought that antibiotic-resistant bacteria cannot spread from one person to another. Conclusion: Establishing an educational intervention program is needed in Saudi universities to improve students' awareness of the specific conditions that can be treated with antibiotics. In addition, it is essential for students to know that antibiotic resistance can affect anyone, of any age, in any country, and that it can be accelerated by the improper use of antibiotics.

Background: The allocation of intensive care unit (ICU) beds for postoperative patients is a difficult task because of expensive and limited resources. Hence, it is imperative that it requires stratification of patients who most deserve ICU admission. With this background, this study was conducted to do a prospective evaluation of postoperative admissions in the ICU over a period of 1 year to analyze the postoperative admissions to the ICU and to formulate recommendations based on limited resources. Aim: To analyze the postoperative admissions to the ICU and to formulate recommendations based on limited resources. Settings and Design: The study was done in a tertiary level teaching hospital in India, over a period of 1 year. All patients meeting the inclusion criteria admitted to the surgical ICU were analyzed in the study as per method designed. Materials and Methods: Postoperative patients were admitted to ICU into three groups: (1) planned, (2) unplanned, and (3) emergency. The study analyzed American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) status, preplanned postoperative ventilation, not reversed due to intraoperative complications (which included those patients who developed intraoperative complications and admitted to ICU for postoperative ventilation), postoperative observation (which included those patients who were admitted to ICU only for monitoring and didn't experience any anticipated perioperative complications) and others causes group. Statistical Analysis: All the statistical analyses were performed using SPSS version 20. Results: In 1 year, total patients operated were 18157 and 261 patients were admitted to ICU. In planned group, maximum patients were ASA III and in unplanned/emergency admissions ASA II. The common cause of postoperative ICU admission in the planned group was postoperative observation (58.80%; 124/211) and in unplanned/emergency group, it was other causes. Maximum patients admitted to ICU were of ASA III (59.40%; 155/261) and for postoperative observation 54.80% (85/155). Conclusions: The authors have a valuable consideration into our standards of anesthetic practice to improve the process of allocating ICU beds for postoperative patient.

Anton–Babinski (AB) syndrome is a form of cortical blindness in which patients are unaware of their blindness despite the definite signs of vision loss. Moreover, patients insist on their ability to see, repeatedly denying their vision loss. This denial of vision loss is a form of visual anosognosia and a hallmark of this syndrome. Although rare, AB syndrome has been well described in literature; however, to our knowledge, there have been no published case reports of patients with AB syndrome in the Middle East. This could be because of the rarity of the diseases or simply because of underdiagnosis of the condition. Here, we report the case of an Arabic female with AB syndrome in order to highlight the importance of physical examination skills in intensive care unit settings where sophisticated observation technology abounds. This case demonstrates how a thorough clinical history and neurological examination are essential in detecting this critical diagnosis early in the course of disease.

Online since 15^th Dec, 2016