Journal: BMC Med Educ. 2009 Dec 2;9(1):70. [Epub ahead of print
Authors: Brimmer DJ, McCleary KK, Lupton TA, Faryna KM, Reeves WC.
NLM Citation: PMID: 19954535
ABSTRACT: BACKGROUND: Chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) affects at least
4 million people in the United States, yet only 16% of people with
CFS have received a diagnosis or medical care for their illness.
Educating health care professionals about the diagnosis and
management of CFS may help to reduce population morbidity associated with CFS.
METHODS: This report presents findings over a 5-year period from May
2000 to June 2006 during which we developed and implemented a health
care professional educational program. The objective of the program
was to distribute CFS continuing education materials to providers at
professional conferences, offer online continuing education credits
in different formats (e.g., print, video, and online), and evaluate
the number of accreditation certificates awarded.
RESULTS: We found that smaller conference size (OR = 80.17; 95% CI
8.80, 730.25), CFS illness related target audiences (OR = 36.0; 95%
CI 2.94, 436.34), and conferences in which CFS research was
highlighted (OR = 4.15; 95% CI 1.16, 14.83) significantly contributed
to higher dissemination levels, as measured by visit rates to the
education booth. While print and online courses were equally
requested for continuing education credit opportunities, the online
course resulted in 84% of the overall award certificates, compared to
14% for the print course. This remained consistent across all
provider occupations: physicians, nurses, physician assistants, and
allied health professionals.
CONCLUSIONS: These findings suggest that educational programs
promoting materials at conferences may increase dissemination efforts
by targeting audiences, examining conference characteristics, and
promoting online continuing education forums.
KEYWORDS: CFS, continuing medical education, primary care/generalist
education, chronic disease, allied health profession.
[Note: This is an Open Access article, the
full text of which can be found for free at
http://www.biomedcentral.com/content/pdf/1472-6920-9-70.pdf ]
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