A multifaceted continuing professional development intervention to move stroke rehabilitation guidelines into professional practice: A feasibility study

ABSTRACT

Introduction

Rehabilitation post-stroke is critical for maximizing patient outcomes. This study assessed the feasibility of implementing and evaluating a continuing professional development (CPD) intervention aimed at increasing the uptake of stroke best practice guidelines among physiotherapists (PTs), occupational therapists (OTs) and speech-language pathologists (SLPs) in six university-affiliated stroke rehabilitation centers in Quebec, Canada.

Method

Twelve stroke best practice recommendations with reflective tools were sent weekly by e-mail. Participants’ eligibility criteria included: a) profession; b) practicing more than 1 year in a stroke rehabilitation program; c) fluency in French or English; and d) basic computer literacy. Feasibility (operationalized via participation, satisfaction and relevance), cognitive impact, perceived application in practice and expected patient outcomes were measured over 24 weeks using three questionnaires and analyzed using descriptive statistics.

Results

The sample totaled 62 of 133 eligible (47%) clinicians. Satisfaction, relevance and cognitive impact of delivered information varied across disciplines and recommendations. Agreement with the recommendations was high across disciplines. On average, three-interdisciplinary recommendations (related to post-stoke depression, post-stoke fatigue and patients’ and caregivers’ learning needs) were rated as the most relevant for at least one patient. The majority of clinicians would use the recommendations for a specific patient and expected health benefits by applying those recommendations.

Conclusion

This study demonstrated the feasibility of assessing the impact of a CPD intervention in stroke rehabilitation uptake and informed the design of a research program aimed at increasing the use of stroke evidence-based rehabilitation interventions.

KEYWORDS:

• Stroke rehabilitation guidelines
• knowledge translation
• digital education
• push-continuing professional development
• outcome-based evaluation
• occupational therapists
• physiotherapists
• speech-language pathologists

Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank Dr. Franceen Kazier for her contributions in development, implementation of the program, Alix Zerbo for her work as project manager and Christina Marini for her work as a clinician.

Additional information

Funding

This study was funded by the Richard and Edith Strauss Canada Foundation from McGill University School of Physical and Occupational Therapy (Montreal, Quebec, Canada). No funding bodies had any role in study design, data collection and analysis, or decision to publish the manuscript.