Turkish patient relatives' attitudes towards family-witnessed resuscitation and affecting sociodemographic factors.

BACKGROUND: Witnessed resuscitation is the process of resuscitation in the presence of family members.

STUDY OBJECTIVE: Our goal was to determine the attitudes of relatives of the patients presenting to our emergency department regarding witnessed resuscitation and to elucidate the sociodemographic variables affecting their perspectives.

METHODS: Blood relatives and spouses of all adult patients presenting to our emergency department in Turkey between 7 January 2005 and 16 January 2005 were included in the study. Accompanying persons other than patients' relatives were excluded. Surveys were conducted using a structured face-to-face interview with the participants.

RESULTS: A total of 420 family members were surveyed. Most participants (66.4%) stated that they would like to be present during resuscitation. The most common reason for wanting to be present during cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) was: 'providing support for the patient' and 'witnessing the intervention'. Male family members and family members of patients without health insurance were more likely to want to witness resuscitation. Although prior willingness to witness CPR did not affect the likelihood of wanting to witness CPR, those family members who had previously witnessed CPR ending in death had decreased likelihood of wanting to witness it again. The participants' age, level of education, marital status, presence of chronic illness, and the patients' presenting diagnosis did not significantly affect the rate of willingness to witness CPR.

CONCLUSION: Our data locally revealed that most of the participants in this survey would like to witness CPR conducted on their family members who presented to our emergency department.