Lewis, D. C. (2012). Towards the identification of family physician learning needs through a reflective process. McGill Family Medicine Studies Online, 07: e08.
Archived by WebCite® at http://www.webcitation.org/6A5iBUhLU.
Background
Continuing professional development stakeholders are continually searching for
better ways of collecting and using data to determine the educational needs of
physicians.
Research questions
1) What, if any, family physician learning needs are revealed through the
reflective process prompted by the Information Assessment Method (IAM)?
2) What is the meaning of the Highlight ratings for the identification and
prioritization of Canadian family physician learning needs?
Methods
A mixed methods sequential explanatory design was employed. Quantitative IAM
data was collected from a family medicine web based e-Therapeutics+
'Highlights’ continuing medical education program over a 22-week period. Six
senior Canadian continuing professional development key informants were
interviewed about the meaning and potential uses of this IAM data in the context
of current needs assessment practices.
Results
3690 family physicians rated at least one highlight (31.4% participation rate). A
mean of 675.2 (range 414-1176) ratings per highlight was recorded. On average,
54.5 % of participants learned something new, 45.7 % were motivated to learn
more and 59.3% found topics to be relevant to at least one patient in practice. Key
informants found that ratings ‘motivation to learn more’ may suggest participants’
learning needs when combined with data from other sources, and that ‘learning’
and ‘relevance’ ratings can reveal information about participants’ knowledge
base.
Conclusions
With data from other sources, IAM data may suggest learning needs, and reveal
topics where physician knowledge was confirmed.