ANAESTHETISTS' ATTITUDES AND PRACTICE OF INFORMED CONSENT IN NIGERIA

Informed consent is an integral part of a surgical and anaesthetic procedure, failure to obtain it may result in grave medico-legal implications.

To determine the attitudes of Nigerian anaesthetists to informed consent.

The study population included physician anaesthetists who attended a continuous medical education programme in November 2015. The target was to cover over 50% of anaesthetists by convenience sampling. The responses to the questions were recorded and descriptive statistics were employed to calculate the various qualitative variables under study.

Fifty-six respondents were analysed, the majority were in the age group 31-40 years (37.5%), consultants were 51.79%, and males constituted 75%. The respondents agreed that the main purposes of informed consent included a need to improve the doctor/patient relationship in 36(64.29%), inform the patient about the desired benefits of the procedure in 32(57.14%), provide the doctor with greater protection against medical litigation in 32(57.14%), and to respect the patient's right of autonomy in 30(53.57%). The general consensus among the respondents was that the anaesthetist should explain to the patient what the procedure entails 40(71.43%), what the procedure aims to achieve and additional procedures that are likely to be necessary to the patient 41(73.21%). It was also agreed that there should be disclosure of all major risks/complications with incidence >1/20 in 29(51.79%) respondents, incidence >1/100 in 20(35.71%), incidence >1/1000, and incidence >1/10000 were 17(30.36%). The respondents who agreed that it is necessary to take consent before performing surgery or anaesthesia on patients and explained the procedure to patients were 48(85.71%).

We determined that informed consent was an integral part of a surgical procedure. which helped to improve doctor/patient relationship, respected the patient's right of autonomy and provided the surgeon and anaesthetists with greater protection against medical litigation. It is paramount to disclose all major risk and complications. However, few anaesthetists 19(33.93%) obtain informed consent from their patients before epidural labour analgesia.