Abstract
Background and Objectives
Lack of knowledge in health care providers may lead to an increased risk and associated complications of blood transfusion. In pediatric nursing care, clinical conditions requiring transfusion are highly urgent. Therefore, assessment of knowledge and clinical decision-making was performed to ensure clinical competency of nursing students.
 
Materials and Methods
This cross-sectional study was performed on 110 nursing students in 2020 by convenience sampling. Data collection was done through a researcher-made questionnaire that was made valid and reliable. The questionnaire included questions about personal characteristics, and those addressing knowledge level and clinical decision-making competence of students. The data was analyzed by SPSS 16 software (p<0.05).
 
Results
The majority of students (97.3%) were under 25 years old, and 55.5% were women. The mean percentage of students' total scores in knowledge areas regarding the use of blood transfusion in pediatric nursing was 50.57 ± 23.06. Moreover, the mean score of clinical decision making competence was 31.33 ± 20.18. There was a significant direct relationship between students' knowledge scores and clinical decision-making scores (r = 0.49, p < 0.001). There was a significant relationship between students’ knowledge and clinical decision-making and some factors including student's occupation, history of transfusion on a family member, and experience of caring for a blood recipient during the apprenticeship periods.
 
Conclusions 
As nursing students lack a sufficient level of knowledge and ability of clinical decision-making, further training courses emphasizing clinical-competency-based educational practices in the field of blood transfusion medicine to improve the patient health are required.