Cardiopulmonary resuscitation for lay people: Evaluation of videos from the perspective of digital health literacy

OBJECTIVE: to analyze the quality indicators and technical content of the videos for lay people posted on the YouTube platform, on cardiopulmonary resuscitation in adults and their audiovisual production regarding the principles of digital health literacy. METHOD: a descriptive and exploratory study, which selected videos recorded between December 2015 and April 2021. They were analyzed by indicators of the production of audiovisual material, considering the American Heart Association guidelines and the principles of digital health literacy. Descriptive and inferential statistics were performed. RESULTS: of the 121 videos analyzed, 26 did not comply with any indicator on cardiopulmonary resuscitation, four reached 81% compliance, eight videos reached 79%, nine reached 69% and 74 videos, from 6% to 63%. According to the principles of digital health literacy, one video met 85% of the indicators, 81 met from 50% to 80% and 39, from 10% to 49%. A positive correlation was identified between literacy and cardiopulmonary resuscitation. CONCLUSION: no video presented 100% compliance with the American Heart Association guidelines. The absence of mechanisms for supervision and control over health-related contents allows for the posting of mistaken videos, which have been used as a learning method by people and can thus miss their greatest goal: save lives.