JCEHP JCEHP JCEHP JCEHP JCEHP  
     title   icon icon icon  
  icon icon icon  
HOME  |  SITE MAP  |  CONTACT US
Your Location: Home > Volume 28, Issue 4 

CURRENT ISSUE

BACK ISSUES

SUBSCRIBE

ADVERTISE

ABOUT JCEHP

FOR AUTHORS

JCEHP AWARD

SEARCH
 
Volume 28 (4)

Volume 28, Issue 4, Fall 2008line
J Contin Educ Health Prof 2008; 28(4):241
ORIGIANL RESEARCH

Comprehensive Evaluation of an Online Tobacco Control Continuing Education Course in Canada
Brigette M. Hales, Laura Hawryluck

A b s t r a c t

Introduction: An understanding of legal, ethical, and cultural concerns and an ability to communicate when faced with clinical dilemmas are integral to the end of life decision-making process. Yet teaching practicing clinicians these important skills in addressing conflict situations is not strongly emphasized.
Methods: A one-day interactive continuing education workshop was designed to improve interactions among multiprofessional intensive care unit (ICU) clinicians, their colleagues, and families in a range of end of life situations using standardized families and colleagues (SF/SCs). Workshop participants completed preworkshop and postworkshop evaluations. Data were analyzed using the McNemar test for paired categorical data to evaluate changes in comfort, knowledge, and skill.
Results: The majority of evaluation respondents were nursing professionals, while only one physician (of two in attendance) responded. Statistically significant improvement was seen in all comfort levels, except when approaching cultural differences. Expectations were exceeded according to 76.2% of responses, while 82.4% rated SF/SCs “excellent” for improving communication skills and comfort levels with ethical and legal dilemmas. Peer discussions were highly valued in meeting educational objectives (95.2% good or excellent), and 95.2% rated achievement of personal learning objectives good or excellent. Qualitative data supported a high overall perception of success and achievement of educational objectives.
Discussion: An interactive workshop can be a valuable educational intervention for building capacity and confidence in end of life communication skills and ethical and legal knowledge for health care providers; further physician involvement is required to extrapolate results to this population.
Key Words: end of life, interactive workshop, continuing education, ethical, legal

Lessons for Practice
  • Experiential learning is an effective way to increase confidence and comfort levels of practicing clinicians in complex, sensitive situations.
  • Standardized families and colleagues provide a unique perspective to practicing clinicians and means of improving on traditional concepts of delivery of sensitive news.
  • Interactive workshops for skills development should provide ample time for peer-to-peer discussions, and feedback from workshop facilitators and actors.
  • Further research in this area should focus on evaluation of the lasting impact of this intervention on clinical practice.

line


Copyright © 1996-2010
JCEHP.com & The Journal of Continuing Education in the Health Professions
All rights reserved
Disclaimer ·  About This Site ·  Web Editor  · Make JCEHP Your Homepage

Information on this site was last updated: 18 June 2010