Purpose
It is necessary for nurses who perform tasks related to life-sustaining treatment to play a supporting role in the decision-making process of life-sustaining treatment for patients and guardians based on their knowledge of decisions and implementation, such as cessation of life-sustaining treatment. Therefore, the Knowledge Scale of the Life-Sustaining Treatment (KS-LST) was developed and reliability and validity were verified.
Methods
Our methodological study aimed at developing tools to measure the knowledge of nurses´ life-saving medical decision system and to verify their reliability and validity. To this end, preliminary questions were constructed through literature review. In this regard, content validity, face validity, k-group comparison, and composition validity through item analysis were verified, and reliability was derived from KR-20.
Results
A total of 26 questions were derived from the 35 preliminary questions through content validity and facial validity; depending on whether they were educated or not, there was a significant difference between the two groups (p=.004). The final 23 questions were derived by deleting 3 questions with low discrimination, and KR-20 was .62.
Conclusion
Using the KS-LST that was developed through this study, we can measure the nurses´ knowledge of the life-sustaining medical decision system and provide education in the deficient areas. We expect nurses with accurate knowledge to provide accurate information to patients and caregivers to help patients make the right choices.

Citations

• Knowledge, Attitudes and Nursing Stress Related to Life-Sustaining Treatment among Oncology Nurses
  Seul Lee, Suyoun Hong, Sojung Park, Soojung Lim
  The Journal of Hospice and Palliative Care.2023; 26(3): 112.     CrossRef