Session: (0724–0751) Health Services Research Poster II
0736: Educational Needs Among Health Professionals in Rheumatology: Low Awareness of EULAR Offerings and Unfamiliarity with Course Content as a Major Barrier – a EULAR Funded European Survey
Medical University Vienna, Institute for Outcomes Research Vienna, Austria
Lisa Sperl1, Tanja Stamm2, Margaret Renn Andrews1, Mathilda Bjork3, Carina Boström4, Jeannette Cappon4, Jenny de la Torre5, Annette de Thurah6, Andrea Domján7, Razvan Dragoi8, Fernando Estévez-López9, Ricardo Ferreira10, George E. Fragoulis11, Jolanta Grygielska12, Katti Kõrve13, Marja Leena Kukkurainen14, Christel Madelaine-Bonjour15, Andréa Marques16, Jorit Meesters17, Rikke Moe18, Ellen Moholt19, Erika Mosor2, Claudia Naimer-Stach20, Mwidimi Ndosi21, Polina Pchelnikova22, Jette Primdahl23, Polina Putrik24, Anne-Kathrin Rausch-Osthoff25, Hana Smucrova26, Marco Testa27, Leti van Bodegom28, Wilfred Peter29, Heidi A. Zangi30, Olena Zimba31, Thea Vliet Vlieland32 and Valentin Ritschl1, 1Medical University of Vienna, CeMSIIS - Center for Medical Statistics, Informatics, and Intelligent Systems, Section for Outcomes Research, Vienna, Austria, 2Medical University of Vienna, CeMSIIS - Center for Medical Statistics, Informatics, and Intelligent Systems, Section for Outcomes Research, Wien, Austria, 3Pain and Rehabilitation Centre, and Department of Health, Medicine and Caring Sciences, Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden, 4Department of Neurobiology, care sciences and society, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden, 5Department of Alicante General and University Hospital, Alicante, Spain, 6Department of Rheumatology, Aarhus University Hospital, Denmark. Department of Clinical Medicine, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark, 7Division of Rheumatology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Debrecen, Debrecen, Hungary, 8Department of Balneology, Rehabilitation and Rheumatology, Research Center for the Assessment of Human Motion, Victor Babes University of Medicine and Pharmacy, Timisoara, Romania, 9Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry/Psychology, Erasmus MC University Medical Center, Rotterdam, Netherlands, 10Rheumatology department – Centro Hospitalar e Universitário de Coimbra, Health Sciences Research Unit: Nursing (UICISA: E), Nursing School of Coimbra, Coimbra, Portugal, 11Joint Rheumatology Programme, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, Greece, 12Department of Polish Rheuma Federation "REF" - member of EULAR PARE, Warsaw, Poland, 13Center of Rheumatology, East Tallinn Central Hospital, Tallinn, Estonia, 14Department of the Finnish Society of Rheumatology Nurses, Helsinki, Finland, 15Department of Department of Rheumatology, Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Vaudois, Lausanne, Switzerland, 16RN at Rheumatology Department, Centro Hospitaler e Universitário de Coimbra Professor at Nursing School of Coimbra, Coimbra, Portugal, 17Department of Orthopaedics, Rehabilitation Medicine and Physical Therapy, Leiden University Medical Center, Leiden, Netherlands, 18National Advisory Unit on Rehabilitation in Rheumatology (NKRR) Division of Rheumatology and Research Diakonhjemmet Hospital, Oslo, Norway, 19Diakonhjemmet Hospital, Oslo, Norway, 20BG/BRG Wolkersdorf, Wolkersdorf, Austria, 21School of Health and Social Welbeing, University of the West of England, Bristol, United Kingdom, 22Standing Committee of People with Arthritis/Rheumatism in Europe (PARE), EULAR, Zürich, Switzerland, 23Department of Regional Health, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark and Danish Hospital for Rheumatic diseases, University Hospital of Southern Denmark, Sønderborg, Denmark, 24Department of Rheumatology, Internal Medicine, MUMC, CAHPRI, Maastricht, Netherlands, 25Department of Zurich University of Applied Sciences, School of Health Sciences, Institute for Physiotherapy, Winterthur, Switzerland, 26Center of Medical Rehabilitation, Institute of Rheumatology, Praha, Czech Republic, 27Department of Neuroscience, Rehabilitation, Ophthalmology, Genetics, Maternal and Child Health, Genoa, Italy, 28Department of Biomedical Data Sciences, Medical Decision Making, Leiden University Medical Center, Leiden, Netherlands, 29Amsterdam Rehabilitation Research Center, Department of Orthopaedics, Rehabilitation Medicine and Physical Therapy, Leiden University Medical Center, Amsterdam, Netherlands, 30Department of Rheumatology and Research, Diakonhjemmet Hospital and Faculty of Health, VID Specialized University, Oslo, Norway, 31Department of Internal Medicine N2, Danylo Halytsky Lviv Neurobiology National Medical University, Lviv, Ukraine, 32Department of Orthopaedics, Rehabilitation and Physical Therapy, Leiden University Medical Center, Leiden, Netherlands
Background/Purpose: Health professionals in rheumatology (HPRs) should participate in post-graduate or continuous education to update and advance their knowledge and skills. This can improve patient outcomes and increase quality of care.1 EULAR aims to become a leading provider of postgraduate education for HPRs. The aims of this study were to evaluate the current motivations for participating in postgraduate education of HPRs, identify barriers and facilitators for participation in postgraduate education, and evaluate participation in the current educational offerings of EULAR for HPRs across Europe.
Methods: An online survey was developed and distributed in collaboration with the EULAR Standing Committee of Education and Training (ESCET) and the Paediatric Rheumatology European Society (PReS). The questionnaire was translated by national HPR representatives in 24 languages to cover the 25 national member organisations. Barriers were assessed using 5-point Likert scales, higher scores representing higher barriers. Quantitative data were analysed using descriptive statistics. In addition, we ran the Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) on the answers to the open questions. LDA is an unsupervised probabilistic topic modelling technique that extracts the meanings of a pre-defined number of topics. Design of the survey and reporting of results were done according to the Checklist for Reporting Results of Internet E-Surveys (CHERRIES).
Results: The online questionnaire was accessed 3,589 times but only 667 complete responses were recorded. HPRs from 34 European countries responded to the survey; 80% of whom were women. The highest-ranked educational need was prevention, including lifestyle interventions and professional development. Although EULAR was well known among HPRs, only 32.1% of HPRs in adult care and 18.6% of HPRs in paediatric care have ever heard of the EULAR School of Rheumatology (Table A). The main barriers to participation in EULAR's educational offerings were identified by HPRs in adult care and in paediatric care (respectively) as: the unfamiliarity with the course content (3.48 [±1.50]; 3.92 [±1.46]), the associated costs (3.44 [±1.35]; 3.69 [±1.28]) and English language (2.59 [±1.50]; 2.80 [±1.34]).
Conclusion: EULAR is well-known by HPRs in Europe, however, awareness of educational offerings is low and barriers to participation are numerous. To become the leading provider of postgraduate training by 2023, EULAR could use a "franchise" model that can be tailored to local conditions. This could be achieved by strengthening national organizations by actively involving them in the development of training programs and disseminating these programs and offerings through their networks. Figure 1: Worldmap of the respondents in this survey. The graph below shows the distribution of the HPRs' responses according to geographical distribution
Table A: Feedback on EULAR. Data are presented separately for HPRs in adult and paediatric care; except for the filter questions, no mandatory questions were included in the survey. To clarify the number of responses per question, the number of valid answers for each question was reported. Disclosures: L. Sperl, None; T. Stamm, AbbVie/Abbott, Roche, Sanofi Genzyme, Takeda, Novartis; M. Andrews, None; M. Bjork, None; C. Boström, None; J. Cappon, None; J. de la Torre, None; A. de Thurah, None; A. Domján, None; R. Dragoi, Pfizer, Elly Lilly, Sandoz, Abbvie, Secom, EwoPharma; F. Estévez-López, None; R. Ferreira, None; G. Fragoulis, None; J. Grygielska, None; K. Kõrve, None; M. Kukkurainen, None; C. Madelaine-Bonjour, None; A. Marques, None; J. Meesters, None; R. Moe, None; E. Moholt, None; E. Mosor, None; C. Naimer-Stach, None; M. Ndosi, None; P. Pchelnikova, None; J. Primdahl, None; P. Putrik, None; A. Rausch-Osthoff, None; H. Smucrova, None; M. Testa, None; L. van Bodegom, None; W. Peter, None; H. Zangi, None; O. Zimba, None; T. Vliet Vlieland, None; V. Ritschl, None.