• Antonio Vicente Valero Marco, Carmen Martínez Castillo, and Loreto Maciá Soler.
• Enfermería, Unidad de Hospitalización de Neumología, Hospital General Universitario, Elche, Alicante, Spain. antonio.valero@ua.es
• Arch. Bronconeumol. 2008 Jul 1; 44 (7): 360-3.

ObjectiveLocal anesthesia is rarely used in arterial puncture, even though it is recommended. The aim of this study was to examine attitudes and beliefs among nurses and third-year undergraduate nursing students in hospital training regarding the use of local anesthesia when performing arterial puncture and to assess their knowledge of the technique.Material And MethodsNurses and nursing students were issued a 15-item questionnaire consisting of 2 parts. The first part contained questions on the nurse's use of local anesthesia when extracting arterial blood for analysis and the second part involved questions regarding technical knowledge of this test. The results of nurses from the respiratory medicine department, nurses from the rest of the hospital, and nursing students were compared.ResultsThe questionnaire was answered by the 131 the nurses surveyed. Valid questionnaires were returned by 17 of the 19 nursing students surveyed. Questionnaires returned by nurses from the respiratory medicine department (n=11) were separated from those returned by the rest of nurses. Local anesthesia was used routinely by 7 nurses (5%), of whom 3 (27%) belonged to the respiratory medicine department; local anesthesia was not used by any of the nursing students. The main reasons given by nurses for not using local anesthesia were lack of knowledge (54%), need to perform 2 punctures when anesthesia is used (11%), belief that the same amount of pain is caused with anesthesia (8%), and success on the first attempt at arterial puncture (7%). The main reason given by student nurses for not using local anesthesia was also lack of knowledge (53%), followed by the fact that it was not used by the nurses (24%). Most of those surveyed (63%) indicated a desire to receive anesthesia should they undergo arterial puncture.ConclusionsLocal anesthesia is used very little in arterial puncture. Knowledge about how to perform arterial blood extraction for blood gas analysis is insufficient and needs to be improved among both nurses and nursing students. Nonetheless it is noteworthy that most of those surveyed indicated a preference for receiving local anesthesia if they were to undergo the procedure. These data should be taken into consideration when training nurses to perform arterial puncture.

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