Validating e-learning in continuing pharmacy education: user acceptance and knowledge change

BMC Medical Education

Samuel Edelbring²  Tadeusz Librowski¹  Krzysztof Nesterowicz¹ 

[1] Department of Radioligands, Jagiellonian University, Medical College, Faculty of Pharmacy, Medyczna 9 Street, Krakow 30-688, Poland;Department of Learning, Informatics, Management and Ethics, Karolinska Institutet, Tomtebodavägen 18A, Stockholm 171 77, Sweden

关键词: Just-in-time learning;    Lifelong learning;    Continuing pharmacy education;    E-learning;   

Others  :  1118354
DOI  :  10.1186/1472-6920-14-33

 received in 2013-07-01, accepted in 2014-01-24,  发布年份 2014

【 摘 要 】

Background

Continuing pharmacy education is becoming mandatory in most countries in order to keep the professional license valid. Increasing number of pharmacists are now using e-learning as part of their continuing education. Consequently, the increasing popularity of this method of education calls for standardization and validation practices. The conducted research explored validation aspects of e-learning in terms of knowledge increase and user acceptance.

Methods

Two e-courses were conducted as e-based continuing pharmacy education for graduated pharmacists. Knowledge increase and user acceptance were the two outcome measured. The change of knowledge in the first e-course was measured by a pre- and post-test and results analysed by the Wilcoxon signed–rank test. The acceptance of e-learning in the second e-course was investigated by a questionnaire and the results analysed using descriptive statistics.

Results

Results showed that knowledge increased significantly (p < 0.001) by 16 pp after participation in the first e-course. Among the participants who responded to the survey in the second course, 92% stated that e-courses were effective and 91% stated that they enjoyed the course.

Conclusions

The study shows that e-learning is a viable medium of conducting continuing pharmacy education; e-learning is effective in increasing knowledge and highly accepted by pharmacists from various working environments such as community and hospital pharmacies, faculties of pharmacy or wholesales.

【 授权许可】

   
2014 Nesterowicz et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd.

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