Background Research indicates clinician knowledge on managing rare events, such as
Malignant Hyperthermia (MH), decreases over time, and new nurses are not adequately prepared
to manage deteriorating patients in practice. Malignant hyperthermia is an infrequent medical
event, but it can lead to devastating consequences. This rare disease can occur in multiple
hospital units. To improve patient outcomes, nurses must understand MH can occur in multiple
settings and recognize MH events early so treatment can be initiated. The Lutheran Health
Network (LHN) identified a need for newly hired nurses to receive educational training on MH
identification. Methodology This Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) project was an evidencebased quality improvement project designed to increase nursing knowledge on identification and
treatment of MH. This project included an in-person MH educational intervention for newly
hired OR and PACU nurses during nurse residency week. Participants completed a demographic
questionnaire followed by a pre-test survey to assess MH knowledge. Then an educational MH
intervention was administered. After the intervention, a post-test was administered to the
participants. Data was collected from demographic questionnaires and the pre-test and post-test
scores. Findings Five aims were used to identify if there was an increase in MH knowledge from
the pre-test to post-test scores. As a group, the average percent change increase for all five aims
was 152%. The average percent change increase for each question on the post-test was 139%.
Conclusions and Implications The findings reveal that an educational intervention as used in
this DNP project can increase nursing knowledge on MH. Incorporating this MH DNP project
into LHN’s nurse residency week is recommended. Furthermore, experienced nurses may benefit
from completing an educational intervention as in this project.