Abstract
This study investigated whether the rectus abdominis muscle width for stoma site marking could be more reliably determined by nursing students using a diagnostic ultrasound imaging system（ultrasound） or palpation.
The subjects were divided into two groups by the technique（ultrasound, n=34; palpation n=39） used to determine rectus abdominis muscle width. For the rectus abdominis muscle width measurement, a mark was placed on the abdominal wall at the lateral border of the rectus abdominis muscle on the horizontal line from the navel of the simulated patient using each technique with a pen, and the distance from the navel to the mark was measured with a ruler. The rectus abdominis muscle width measured by a faculty member proficient in ultrasound using the same technique as the students in the ultrasound group was compared with the rectus abdominis muscle width measured by students. The analysis calculated the intraclass correlation coefficients and used Bland-Altman analysis to determine the presence of a fixed and a proportional bias.
The intraclass correlation coefficients were .62 in the ultrasound group and .41 in the palpation group. There was no fixed bias in both groups, but a proportional bias was present in the palpation group.
These results indicate that students’ determinations of rectus abdominis muscle width were more reliable using ultrasound, suggesting that ultrasound is useful for stoma site marking.
