Original Articles AWARENESS OF PRE-HOSPITAL FIRST AID AMONG MULTIDISCIPLINARY UNIVERSITY STUDENTS: AN ANALYSIS

Abstract

Background:
World Health Organization claimed that more than 1.25 million people are killed annually by road traffic accidents. Likewise, in Pakistan, many people are also killed by road accidents or other emergencies due to the unavailability of first aid at the place of the incident. Medical students are little taught to provide pre-hospital first aid but non-medical students are not. Therefore, many victims lose their lives or become disabled. The objective of the study was to analyze the awareness level of first aid among multidisciplinary students of the university in relation to their previous training status.

Material and methods:
A cross-sectional survey was conducted among 1315 multi-disciplinary students by using a self-administered questionnaire consisting of three-level Likert scale questions regarding first aid awareness. The χ2 and t-test were used with the help of SPSS.

Results:
The results showed that only 12.2% of students had a good level of awareness. T-test showed that previously trained students had more awareness of first aid than untrained students, likewise and χ2 test showed that the opinion of previously traned students “that first aid training should be mandatory for university students” significantly differed from previously untrained students.

Conclusion:
The study concluded that the level of awareness among multi-disciplinary university students was very low and immense action must be taken to improve it.