Knowledge and attitudes about advance directives on physicians and nurses

Objectives: To describe and compare the knowledge and attitudes of the physicians and nurses towards the advance directives. Design: A descriptive, cross-sectional pilot study. Setting: East healthcare area of the Community of Madrid (Spain) Participants: Primary care and specialized care physicians and nurses. Main measurements: Questionnaire about knowledge, use and attitudes from the healthcare professionals over the advance directives given, with dichotomous and Likert scale (0-10) variables. Results: Replies were received from a total of 192 physicians and nurses (response rate = 83,4%), 72,4% were women and 27,6% were men. The mean age was 39,6 years (SD = 10,86). For general knowledge on advance directives the median was 5 (RI = 3-7). 60,1% were aware of the regulation by law, but only 22,8% had read the document. Conclusions: The knowledge of physicians and nurses on advance directives is low, so it is necessary to improve this knowledge. Physicians and nurses from both levels show positive attitude towards the use and usefulness and respect the contents of advance directive. The methodology proposed is efficient to implement in a larger study, but should improve the distribution and collection of questionnaires. (C) 2012 Elsevier Espana, S.L. All rights reserved.