Introduction:

Most of the victims of sudden cardiac arrest in an out-of-hospital setting do not receive cardiopulmonary resuscitation; it is necessary to raise awareness about the importance of this skill and to train the population.

Objective:

To evaluate the acquisition of skills in CPR and application of AED with the use of educational resources in undergraduate medical students.

Method:

Longitudinal study in which 3 evaluations were made to third-year undergraduate medical students, during 2017 and 2018, using a 27-item checklist. The participants were divided into a group A, to whom educational resources were provided, and group B, to whom they were not provided. Between the first and second evaluation, the students had deliberate practice with low fidelity simulators, guided by facilitators, in which they learned CPR and use of AED; there was another reinforcing practice between the second and the third evaluation.

Results:

In the first evaluation there were 84 participants in group A, who obtained a score of 25.01% of the evaluation, while group B had 86 participants with 11.20%; 8 weeks later they had the second evaluation, in it 65 participants from Group A and 80 from B remained, with a score of 68.97% and 66.27%, without significant difference (p=0.546) using the Wilcoxon signed-rank test.

In the following school year the last evaluation was applied: the sample was reduced to 19 and 38 participants for group A and group B, with a score of 80.52% and 79.28%, without significant difference (p = 0.968).

Conclusions:

Educational resources did not make a significant difference in the acquisition of skills, but reinforcing the deliberate practice improved them. To ensure the progress of the students' skills and provide timely feedback for improvement, it is necessary to evaluate and monitoring.