Iran Journal of Nursing

Introduction
Nowadays, the number of patients in need of anesthesia care has increased. The goal of providing training to the anesthesia care team is to train staff with theoretical and functional abilities to deal with clinical challenges and maintain patient safety. However, some reports show a low level of knowledge and practice regarding anesthesia care in healthcare providers and students immediately after graduation. This study aims to assess the competence of anesthesia personnel of hospitals in Kashan, Iran, and the related factors.

Methods
This is a descriptive-analytical study that was conducted on 95 anesthesia personnel working in private and public hospitals affiliated to Kashan University of Medical Sciences in 2023, who were selected using a census method. The inclusion criteria were at least an Associate’s degree in anesthesia and more than 3 months of work experience as anesthesia personnel. The uncompleted questionnaire was excluded. Data were collected by using a demographic form and the Persian version of the Anesthesia Nursing Competence Scale developed by Jeon et al. Its total score ranges from 0 to 100; a score <60 shows low competence, a score of 60-80 indicates moderate competence, and a score >80 shows high competence. The collected data were analyzed in SPSS v.22 software using descriptive statistics (frequency, mean, standard deviation), Mann-Whitney U test, Kruskal-Wallis test, Spearman’s correlation test, Point-Biserial correlation test, and regression analysis.

Results 
The mean age of the participants was 34.57±10.1 years. The majority of them were female (72.6 %) and married (67.4 %), with a bachelor’s degree (86.3%). The mean competence score was 84.84±11.53. Only 3.2% had low competence; 25.3% had moderate competence and 71.6% had high competence. The competence of anesthesia personnel in six areas: Ethics of anaesthesia care (Mean=84.89±12.73), patient engagement with technology (Mean=84.59±11.97), collaboration within patient care (Mean=88.37±11.75), Anaesthesia patient care with medication (Mean=86.95±12.32), peri‐anaesthesia nursing intervention (Mean=87.63±12.53), and Knowledge of anaesthesia patient care (Mean=82.07±13.1) were at a high level. In the area of “Patient’s risk care” (Mean=79.41±15.15), their competence was at a moderate level. The competence of anesthesia personnel had a significant relationship with their sex and marital status (P<0.05).

Conclusion
According to the results of the present study, the competence of anesthesia personnel in Kashan is high except for the patient’s risk care. This study suggested that more attention and planning is needed to improve the level of anesthesia personnel’s competence in the field of patient’s risk care.

Ethical Considerations
Compliance with ethical guidelines
This study was approved by the ethics committee of Kashan University of Medical Sciences (Code: IR.KAUMS.NUHEPM.REC.1401.082).

Funding
This paper was extracted from the master’s thesis/ from a research project of the first author, approved by the Department of Anesthesiology, Faculty of Paramedicine, Kashan University of Medical Sciences. This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

Authors' contributions
Conceptualization, methodology, initial draft preparation, review & editing, data collection, investigation, writing original draft: Samira Mahmoudi; Methodology, review & editing, data analysis and interpretation: Akram Yazdani; Supervision, review & editing: Fatemeh Hasan Shiri.

Conflict of interest
The authors declared no conflict of interest.

Acknowledgments
The authors would like to thank Mr. Armin Feridouni for his assistance in conducting this research.


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