Enhancers and Barriers to Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation Practices by Nurses and Midwives: A Cross-sectional Study of Selected Hospitals in North-central Nigeria

Background: Cardiopulmonary resuscitation is one of the basic lifesaving medical procedures that is performed to revitalize a patient with cardiac arrest, suffocation, near-dying, or circumstance that results in cardiac or pulmonary failure or both. The study investigated the enhancers and barriers that influence the practice of cardiopulmonary resuscitation among nurses and midwives at selected hospitals in North Central Nigeria. Methods: The study employed a descriptive cross-sectional design to collect data via an adapted tool by Guteta (2022), and a researcher-developed questionnaire with a reliability coefficient of 0.70 from a consecutive sample of 140 nurses and midwives, of which only 80 responses were deemed valid for data analysis. Data were collected through a Google Form by sending the link via group WhatsApp to the participants and were analyzed descriptively using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 16.0. Results: Results reveal that 82.06% have overall knowledge of CPR. On the level of practice, 82.06% of the nurses had high practice in CRP, while 17.04% had low practice in CPR procedures. However, participants testified that CPR is not the responsibility of the junior nurse alone (mean score = 1.54), religion allows their body to come in contact with opposite sex (mean score = 2.25) and, followed by, it is taboo for women to put their mouth into the mouth of a man outside marriage (mean score = 1.67). Significant correlations were identified between the levels of knowledge, practice and sociodemographic factors, including marital and knowledge (spearman’s rho = 0.026), religion and knowledge (spearman’s rho = - 0.066), marital and the practice (spearman’s rho = 0.147) and knowledge and practice (spearman’s rho = 0.396) Conclusion: The study concludes that marriage, religious beliefs, and cultural taboos are perceived as barriers to the practice of cardiopulmonary resuscitation, while knowledge serves as key enhancer. Therefore, it is recommended that nurses and midwives receive training on overcoming biases and promoting diversity, ensuring culturally sensitive and inclusive practices within nursing teams to enhance holistic patient care. Keywords: Barriers, Cardiopulmonary, Resuscitation, Practice, Enhancers, Nurses-Midwives