Objectives:Although Spinal anesthesia is the most common and safe anesthetic method for patients undergoing cesarean section, difficult access to it is a frequent problem in operating theaters. The predictive factors for the difficulty of spinal anesthesia in patients undergoing cesarean section were investigated.Methods:A total of 110 pregnant women, single-stranded, aged 18-40 years old and ASA class I or II candidates for elective cesarean section with spinal anesthesia were studied. Demographic information, body appearance, ability to bend the back of the patient was recoded. Also the position of the anatomical landmarks of the lumbar spine, the presence or absence of deformity in the spinal column lumbar was recorded for all patients.Results:The correlation coefficient of age, weight, body mass index, general body appearance, retention ability, anatomical signs of the spinal column (touching the spinous process) and the interval between the vertebra with the difficulty of spinal anesthesia were statistically significant (p<0.05). Complications after spinal anesthesia had a statistically significant relationship with the difficulty of performing spinal blockade (p: 0.006).Conclusion:Increasing age, weight, body mass index, reducing the ability to bend the waist, the non-touching of the spinous process and interstitial space causes the difficulty of performing spinal anesthesia in patients undergoing cesarean section. The results can contribute to determining and designing a spinal blockade scoring system based on the patient’s characteristics and effective factors before the surgery, to facilitate the technique by anesthesiologist.

Background and aims:The ability to communicate is a basic skill for human beings and some people in this area are more capable than the others. That's why communication skills training is one of the medical education issues that have been emphasized in recent years. These skills are taught, measured and evaluated with different methods. This study aimed to investigate the Tabriz University of Medical Sciences newly-arrived residents' satisfaction of patient-physician communication workshops conducted in 1394.Methods:A cross-sectional study was conducted on 150 newly-arrived residents in all clinical training subjects. Data was collected using researcher-made questionnaire for satisfaction of environment and training facilities, teachers teaching and presentations and course content. The validity and reliability of questionnaires were assessed in good level, through conducting a pilot study. The data was analyzed using SPSS.Results:The results showed that all newly-arrived residents' satisfaction of patient-physician communication workshops is above the cutoff point (m=4.26±.49). Of the variables studied the greatest satisfaction were teaching methods (4.52±0.26), presentations (m=4.32±.36) and environment and training facilities (m=4.22±0.23). The survey of satisfaction showed no significant statistical difference between the assistants by different fields (p=0.1).Conclusion:The residents' satisfaction of patient-physician communication workshops is highly desirable which is the reason for this workshop to be hold annually.