¬Knowledge and application of the who safe surgical checklist amongst clinical medical students in a teaching Hospital in north-central, Nigeria: A quantitative analytical study

Abstract

This checklist serves as a tool to enhance communication and teamwork among surgical teams, reducing the occurrence of adverse events during surgery. However, its implementation and utilization in some regions especially the LMICs in Africa present unique challenges. This study aimed to explore the knowledge and application of the WHO surgical checklist among clinical medical students in north -central zone of Nigeria. This was done via a single-blinded cross-sectional study among 186 penultimate and final-year clinical medical students at Bingham University Teaching Hospital, Nigeria. We found that 25.8% and 22.6% of the respondents had good and very good knowledge of the WHO Safe Surgical Checklist, respectively. About half of the respondents acquired their knowledge from the classroom alone, while the others were from class lectures and extracurricular activities. The most applied component of the surgical checklist was the sign-in (61.3%), followed by the sign-out (38.7%), while the time-out was the least (32.2%). While the general surgeons (36%) and the obstetricians and gynecologists (29%) were the most likely to adhere to the safe surgical checklists in their procedures, the orthopaedics surgeons were the least likely (3%). While the sign-in remains the most applied component of the checklist, with time-out being the least, we should know that each component has its safety potential.