First Aid Knowledge and Attitude of Secondary School Students in Saudi Arabia

Abstract

Background: Increasing the number of qualified people, including school students who can play a significant role in first-aid (FA) and basic life support (BLS) arena is a public health demand. Aim: To assess the awareness of Saudi secondary school students regarding FA and BLS. Methodology: 360 male secondary school children in Taif, Saudi Arabia were surveyed. Results: The mean students’ age was 17.4 ± 1.21 years. The mean participants’ FA knowledge score was 64.8% ± 11%. Generally, trained students reported both better FA knowledge and skills than untrained counterparts; for 79.6% trained-compared to 53.7% untrained-students recorded such score > 70% [χ2(df 1) = 11.60, p < 0.001]. The younger the age was, the higher opportunity to record a high score (>70%) [62.3% <17 y vs. 49.3% ≥17 y, χ2(df 1) = 5.90, p = 0.02] was. Trained students better deal with critical cases, bleeding and bodily injury compared to untrained peers [89.8% vs. 55.9%, χ2(df 1) = 20.3, p < 0.001; 83.7% vs...