A teachable moment for the teachable moment? A prospective study to evaluate delivery of a workshop designed to increase knowledge and skills in relation to alcohol brief interventions (ABIs) amongst final year nursing and occupational therapy undergraduates

Abstract

The perceived value of Alcohol Brief Interventions as a tool to address alcohol misuse in Scotland has supported the establishment of a Health Improvement, Efficiency, Access and Treatment, HEAT: H4 Standard to deliver ABIs within certain health care settings. This requires that nursing, medical and allied health professionals are appropriately skilled to deliver these interventions. This study explores the knowledge and attitudes regarding alcohol misuse and related interventions among two cohorts of final year nursing and occupational therapy undergraduate students before, during and following participation in a workshop devoted to ABI delivery. While relatively good knowledge around recommended limits for daily consumption was evident, this did not translate into competence relating to drink unit content. Although there was overwhelming agreement for the role of each profession in ABI delivery, less than half of students in each cohort at the outset of the workshop agreed that they had the appropriate knowledge to advise patients about responsible drinking. In both cohorts, at the three month follow-up stage, this percentage had almost doubled. Newly qualified practitioners perceived a wider role for motivational interviewing, and endorsed interactive delivery of alcohol education throughout all levels of the curriculum.

Educating undergraduate occupational therapy and physiotherapy students in motivational interviewing: the student perspective

“…First is the importance of practice within the training. This emphasis was both clear in this study and supported by other related papers [18, 23, 29]. For Schoo and colleagues [18], the relevance of this practice was enhanced through the addition of a reflective piece and that could be considered.…”

“…Consequently, there is a dearth of research regarding student perspectives on the experience of implementation and transferability of MI skills. Prior studies examining the application of MI among clinicians have indicated the potential utility but also highlighted the implementation challenges including limited time and patient resistance [22] suggesting a need to focus on the quality of implementation not just its training [19, 23]. Further exploration of the student specific challenges facing implementation to practice is warranted.…”

Comparison of Instructional Methods for Screening, Brief Intervention, and Referral to Treatment for Substance Use in Nursing Education

“…A number of projects have embedded SBIRT training into baccalaureate and graduate nursing education with positive outcomes, including high training satisfaction, increased knowledge, and improved attitudes, confidence, self-efficacy, and self-perceived competence toward addressing substance use. 7 - 12 An SBIRT training initiative targeting family nurse practitioner students showed that students who reported higher levels of perceived competence posttraining were more likely to screen for substance use during their clinical practice, underscoring the importance of infusing this curriculum. 8 …”

The relationship between smoking and convivial, intimate and negative coping alcohol consumption in young adults

“…Nurses and healthcare professionals have a critical role in providing motivational interviewing and behaviour change interventions in individuals (O'May et al., ; Östlund, Wadensten, Häggström, Lindqvist, & Kristofferzon, ) and organise and execute health‐promoting activities in larger groups for modifying their health risk behaviours. Based on this and other studies, healthcare professionals should consider carefully the social context and additional social constructs, such as gender, during their assessments (Koutra et al., ; Kritsotakis et al., , ).…”