International Journal of Community Medicine and Public Health | September 2020 | Vol 7 | Issue 9 Page 3581 International Journal of Community Medicine and Public Health Kawale SN et al. Int J Community Med Public Health. 2020 Sep;7(9):3581-3584 http://www.ijcmph.com pISSN 2394-6032 | eISSN 2394-6040 Original Research Article Basic life support: a cross-sectional study of knowledge in undergraduate medical students of Maharashtra Suchita Narayan Kawale 1 *, Manjusha A. Shinde 2 , Prashant Satwaji Shinde 3 INTRODUCTION Basic life support (BLS) is defined as medical procedures and skills that can be utilized in case of emergency to save lives. Knowledge of BLS is absolute necessity for medical professionals to face acute medical emergencies. 1 In 1966 the American heart association (AHA) developed the first CPR (cardio-pulmonary resuscitation) guidelines which have been followed by regular updates. 2 According to American Heart Association, each and everyone should learn CPR. It has been observed that fresh medical students lack proper knowledge, skills, and attitude (KSA) regarding CPR (unconscious incompetence). 3 Globally, about 92% out-of-hospital cardiac arrest subjects lose their lives due to limited availability of CPR facilities. One of the leading causes of death and disability worldwide is out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) and it contributes to as high as 10% of total mortality in developing countries. 4 The inadequate knowledge of resuscitation has been reported globally. Studies from India, Turkey, Greece, Nigeria, and Nepal also cite a lack of knowledge regarding CPR among healthcare professionals. 5-8 Hence this study was conducted on the undergraduate medical students to assess their knowledge about Basic ABSTRACT Background: Basic life support (BLS) is defined as medical procedures and skills that can be utilized in case of emergency to save lives. Objective was to study the knowledge of basic life support in undergraduate medical students of Maharashtra. Methods: A cross-sectional study on undergraduate medical students from first to final year MBBS in July 2018 in the Community Medicine department, Government medical college, Maharashtra. Results: Out of the total 300 students, 59.34% were females and 40.66% were males. 42% were from first MBBS, 38% from second and 20% from final MBBS. While 67% had previous training of BLS and 38% had performed CPR before. (91%) knew abbreviation of BLS (32%) students could identify location for chest compression in adults, (31%) knew the compression rate and (19%) knew about rescue breathing in infants. While (30%) and (21%) had the knowledge on depth of chest compression in adults and infants respectively. However, only (31%) and (29%) knew that the recommended chest compression to ventilation ratio in adult and infants respectively. Conclusions: The study highlights that majority of students were lacking the knowledge of basic life support. It is the need of the hour to provide BLS training to all the medical students. Keywords: Basic life support, Knowledge, Undergraduate medical students 1 Department of Community Medicine, ESIC Medical College and Hospital, Sanathnagar, Hyderabad, Telangana, India 2 Department of Physiology, Chalmeda Anandrao Institute of Medical Sciences, Bommakal Village, Karimnagar, Telangana, India 3 Department of Hepatology, Yashoda Hospital, Secunderabad, Hyderabad, Telangana, India Received: 01 July 2020 Revised: 05 August 2020 Accepted: 10 August 2020 *Correspondence: Dr. Suchita Narayan Kawale, E-mail: suchisuccess80@gmail.com Copyright: © the author(s), publisher and licensee Medip Academy. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License, which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.18203/2394-6040.ijcmph20203926