A Video Based Training Program Improves Defibrillator Inspection Compliance

Improperly maintained defibrillators are an important cause of defibrillation delay or failure during in-hospital cardiac arrest. This study investigated whether a brief training video of how to properly inspect crash carts and defibrillators would improve the quality and frequency of these inspections. The study was a before–after cohort design. Crash cart inspection logs were explicitly examined, and the electronic archive records of the defibrillators were interrogated. The compliance and quality of inspections were compared before and after the implementation of the training video program. The missed-inspection rate for defibrillators significantly improved from 8.9% to 6.9% (p = 0.037) after video training program implementation. The missed-inspection rate for crash carts, however, actually worsened from 2.7% before to 8.0% (p = 0.0001). The introduction of a new crash cart inspection training video program improved the frequency and quality of defibrillator inspections but not crash cart inspections. The inspection of crash carts and defibrillators is a vital hospital task. Because available training time for clinical personnel is limited, our 15-minute video can be viewed on a ward computer workstation at the most convenient time.