CPR in medical TV shows: non-health care student perspective

Abstract

Introduction

There are over a dozen medical shows airing on television, many of which are during prime time. Researchers have recently become more interested in the role of these shows, and the awareness on cardiopulmonary resuscitation. Several cases have been reported where a lay person resuscitated a family member using medical TV shows as a reference. The purpose of this study is to examine and evaluate college students’ perception on cardiopulmonary resuscitation and when to shock using an automated external defibrillator based on their experience of watching medical TV shows.

Methods

A total of 170 students (nonmedical major) were surveyed in four different colleges in the United States. The survey consisted of questions that reflect their perception and knowledge acquired from watching medical TV shows. A stepwise regression was used to determine the significant predictors of “How often do you watch medical drama TV shows” in addition to chi-square analysis for nominal variables.

Results

Regression model showed significant effect that TV shows did change students’ perception positively (p<0.001), and they would select shock on asystole as the frequency of watching increases (p=0.023).

Conclusion

The findings of this study show that high percentage of nonmedical college students are influenced significantly by medical shows. One particular influence is the false belief about when a shock using the automated external defibrillator (AED) is appropriate as it is portrayed falsely in most medical shows. This finding raises a concern about how these shows portray basic life support, especially when not following American Heart Association (AHA) guidelines. We recommend the medical advisors in these shows to use AHA guidelines and AHA to expand its expenditures to include medical shows to educate the public on the appropriate action to rescue an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest patient.

Keywords:

• medical shows
• cardiopulmonary resuscitation
• CPR
• college student

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank the participating schools and students for their participation in this study. Special thanks to Dr. Evelyn Massey, Director of the AHA Life Support Education Center at Loma Linda University, for the time she took to review the survey for content validity. In addition, we would like to thank Mr. Louis Kelly for his time to review the manuscript as well.

Disclosure

The authors report no conflicts of interest in this work.