Effectiveness of an online continuing education course in infant hearing health for primary care professionals

Abstract

Objective

To evaluate the effectiveness of an online continuing education course on infant hearing health for primary care professionals.

Design

A prospective longitudinal study with interrupted time series pre-test/post-test design. The effectiveness of the online course was assessed by comparing pre- vs. post-training performance and analysing responses to evaluations of the quality of the course.

Study sample

The sample comprised individuals enrolled between September 2018 and August 2019 in a Ministry of Health course, “Actions in primary care for the early identification of hearing impairment” offered on the AVASUS platform.

Results

Of the 2908 individuals registered, 1842 (63.3%) completed the course. Their ages ranged from 18 to 77 years, and 67.4% of them were females. Students and doctors were overrepresented among the enrollees. All Brazilian states were included in the sample. Comparisons of pre- and post-training performances showed a significant improvement in knowledge, and 99.3% of the participants provided positive comments regarding the quality of the course.

Conclusions

The course is an effective distance learning tool on infant hearing health for primary care professionals. The online course circumvents the limitations posed by geographical barriers and also facilitates decentralisation.

Keywords:

• Capacity building in service
• community health worker
• neonatal screening
• hearing
• virtual learning environment

Acknowledgements

This study was funded in part by Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior-Brazil (CAPES) (grant code 001).

Author contributions

All authors contributed equally to this work. M.T.D.O. conducted acquisition, analysis, and interpretation of data, wrote the paper, created the figures, and approved the final version to be published. E.S.A. provided substantial contributions to the design of the study, data analysis and interpretation, critical revisions for important intellectual content, and approved the final version to be published. K.T.L.C. and V.B.G.R. provided substantial contributions to data acquisition, analysis, and interpretation, created the figures, and approved the final version to be published. S.A.B., L.C.B.J.-C., and K.F.A. provided substantial contributions to the design of the study, data interpretation, critical revisions for important intellectual content, and approved the final version to be published.

Ethical approval

Approval was obtained from the ethics committee of the University of Rio Grande do Norte. The procedures used in this study adhere to the tenets of the Declaration of Helsinki and its later amendments (Ethics approval number: 2,932,992). Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study. Consent for the Privacy Policy and Terms and Conditions of the site [AVASUS] was obtained.

Disclosure statement

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.