Studying the Attitude and Knowledge of Nursing Students towards the Physical Restraint Use in Patients

Physical restraints used by the medical staff are one of the measures to prevent patients from harming themselves and their caregivers in times of agitation. Considering the special sensitivity of the nursing job, the degree of preparation of nursing students for the proper utilization of physical restraints is very important. Therefore, the current study was done to investigate the attitude and knowledge of nursing students about physical restraint use in patients. The current study is descriptive-analytical and sampling was done by census method. To collect data, a standard questionnaire of attitude and knowledge on physical restraints use and a demographic information form was used. Data analysis was done by SPSS version 16 software and independent t-tests, Pearson's correlation coefficient, and one-way analysis of variance. The significance level of the data was less than 0.05. Based on the results obtained from the present study, the average level of attitude was reported for most of the participants. Only 19.7% of students had good knowledge about the use of physical restraints. Master's students had better knowledge than undergraduate students, and this difference was statistically significant (P<0.005). Based on the results of the study, the state of knowledge and attitude of students is not favorable. Since nursing students are future nurses, it is necessary to consider corrective measures to improve their condition in the field of physical restraints.