Knowledge, attitude, and skill of medical students in dealing with patients with cardiac disorders before and after the cardiac internship

Introduction: Patients with heart diseases who require emergency care need rapid diagnosis and treatment. Medical students are usually among the first individuals to be trained to help these patients in the course of their internship in the treatment chain and have a significant role in reducing mortality and morbidity among patients with heart diseases referred to the emergency ward. Methods: In this cross-sectional descriptive-analytical study that was conducted in Tabriz, Iran, in 2016, 100 medical students were enrolled in a census course. Knowledge, attitude, and skill of interns toward airway management were evaluated in patients by the students before and after the cardiac internship using a valid and reliable researcher-made self-assessment questionnaire. Data were then analyzed using SPSS software. Results: Although the level of knowledge and skill of the interns before and after the cardiovascular education course was significant (P ≤ 0.001), the knowledge and skill scores were lower than the average before and after the course. There was no significant relationship between the gender of the interns with knowledge, attitude, and skill. There was also no significant relationship between the marital status of the participants and the level of knowledge and skills of the interns. Married people had a more positive attitude toward managing patients with cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) compared others (P = 0.013). Conclusion: The level of knowledge and skills of interns in dealing with cardiac patients, before and after the education of cardiac course was low, requiring more attention to training of students in this field.