Jorjani Biomedicine Journal

Background and objectives: Despite the long history of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR), there are still major concerns about poor CPR team performance in hospitals. While only 10-15 percent of those undergoing CPR leave the hospitals alive, the statistics vary in different countries. Since addressing the barriers to successful CPR may help prevent the potential risks to future patients, the present study aimed to identify such barriers from the perspective of nurses.

Methods: In a descriptive-analytic study in 2011, 200 nurses, including 68 men (34 percent) and 132 women (66 percent), employed at four teaching hospitals affiliated to Golestan University of Medical Sciences (Iran) were randomly selected. Data were collected through a researcher-made questionnaire. Descriptive (frequency, mean, and standard deviation) and inferential statistics were applied for data analysis. All analyses were performed with SPSS version 16 .

Results: The majority of nurses (83 percent) had an experience of working with a CPR team. The participating nurses suggested absence of timely clinical CPR (98 percent), lack of regular standard in-service training (98 percent), lack of CPR equipment and supplies in the wards (92 percent), lack of efficient communication among team members (90 percent), and underlying diseases of the patients (88 percent) as the most important barriers to successful CPR.

Conclusion: Considering the poor performance of CPR teams in hospitals, management of this challenge requires more attention of planners and hospital authorities. Holding standard retraining programs to update the staff’s knowledge and improve their skills would be essential to forming a competent and cohesive CPR team.

Pluripotent stem cells as the cells with a capacity for self-renewal and differentiation into various specific

cell types have been highly regarded in regenerative medicine studies. To repair the eye disease damages, the

differentiation into retinal pigment epithelial cells of pluripotent stem cells has gained great importance in

recent decades because the inappropriate function of these cells is the main cause of degenerative diseases such

as the age-related macular degeneration. Millions of people in the world suffer this disease.

To restore the damaged cells and, finally, to improve the vision, numerous studies have been conducted on using

pluripotent stem cells, their differentiation into retinal pigment epithelial cells, and finally, their application

in cell therapy. Based on this, many researchers have attempted to produce highly efficient retinal pigment

epithelial cells, such that they show a proper function after transplant, along with the host cells. In this review

article, the importance and the role of pigment epithelial cells, as well as, the studies on the in vitro production

of these cells were examined