Development of a Simple 12-Item Theory-Based Instrument to Assess the Impact of Continuing Professional Development on Clinical Behavioral Intentions

Abstract

BackgroundDecision-makers in organizations providing continuing professional development (CPD) have identified the need for routine assessment of its impact on practice. We sought to develop a theory-based instrument for evaluating the impact of CPD activities on health professionals' clinical behavioral intentions.Methods and FindingsOur multipronged study had four phases. 1) We systematically reviewed the literature for instruments that used socio-cognitive theories to assess healthcare professionals' clinically-oriented behavioral intentions and/or behaviors; we extracted items relating to the theoretical constructs of an integrated model of healthcare professionals' behaviors and removed duplicates. 2) A committee of researchers and CPD decision-makers selected a pool of items relevant to CPD. 3) An international group of experts (n = 70) reached consensus on the most relevant items using electronic Delphi surveys. 4) We created a preliminary instrument with the items found most relevant and assessed its factorial validity, internal consistency and reliability (weighted kappa) over a two-week period among 138 physicians attending a CPD activity. Out of 72 potentially relevant instruments, 47 were analyzed. Of the 1218 items extracted from these, 16% were discarded as improperly phrased and 70% discarded as duplicates. Mapping the remaining items onto the constructs of the integrated model of healthcare professionals' behaviors yielded a minimum of 18 and a maximum of 275 items per construct. The partnership committee retained 61 items covering all seven constructs. Two iterations of the Delphi process produced consensus on a provisional 40-item questionnaire. Exploratory factorial analysis following test-retest resulted in a 12-item questionnaire. Cronbach's coefficients for the constructs varied from 0.77 to 0.85.ConclusionA 12-item theory-based instrument for assessing the impact of CPD activities on health professionals' clinical behavioral intentions showed adequate validity and reliability. Further studies could assess its responsiveness to behavior change following CPD activities and its capacity to predict health professionals' clinical performance.

Implementing shared decision-making in interprofessional home care teams (the IPSDM-SW study): protocol for a stepped wedge cluster randomised trial

“…Healthcare professionals' behavioural intention to engage into SDM will be measured before and after the intervention with a 12-item theory-based instrument assessing the impact of continuing professional development 37. Tutorial and workshop also include an evaluation component.…”

Supporting underserved patients with their medicines: a study protocol for a patient/professional coproduced education intervention for community pharmacy staff to improve the provision and delivery of Medicine Use Reviews (MURs)

“…The questionnaire will collect the following data: (1) participant characteristics, that is, age, gender, educational achievement and details of any MUR training received, years qualified as a registered pharmacist; (2) pharmacy characteristics, for example, geographical area, ownership type (eg, large multiples, supermarkets) and economic deprivation (deprivation index will be obtained through the UK Office of National Statistics (ONS) data for each pharmacy using the postcode as the lookup reference); (3) pharmacist and support-staff attitudes will be assessed through attitudinal statements developed from the ‘inequalities imagination’ framework24 (this framework enables healthcare professionals to more fully meet the needs of ‘underserved’ or ‘disadvantaged’ patients) and (4) pharmacist/support-staff behaviour change assessed through a 12-item theory-based instrument 25. This validated tool with robust metric properties is used to assess the impact of continuing professional development activities on health professionals' clinical behavioural intention change.…”

Les leviers du transfert des acquis en formation continue du médecin généraliste. Elaboration d’un modèle conceptuel opérationnalisable

“…Chercheurs et praticiens s'accordent à dire que la proportion des apprentissages réalisés en formation qui est ensuite mise en pratique sur le lieu de tavail est faible [1] . Les mêmes constats sont faits en formation médicale continue [2,3] . Il est donc important d'en comprendre les leviers pour pouvoir l'augmenter.…”

“…Ce cadre théorique a ainsi été choisi car les médecins généralistes jouissent d'une grande autonomie et parce qu'il s'agit d'une théorie du changement de comportement robuste et validée [10] . Par ailleurs, la revue systématique de Légaré [3] et al de 76 études ayant utilisé les théories socio-cognitives pour expliquer les comportements cliniques des professionnels de la santé a montré que cette théorie était la plus appropriée pour prédire le comportement des professionnels de santé.…”

“…Par ailleurs, trois de ces facteurs font partie des quatre facteurs identifiés par Légaré et al [3] dans le cadre du développement d'un outil théorique pour évaluer l'impact du développement professionnel continu (dont la formation continue) sur les intentions de mettre en pratique le nouveau comportement clinique. Ces facteurs sont les croyances à propos des capacités (facteur proche de celui du SEP), les croyances à propos des conséquences (facteur proche de l'attitude envers le transfert) et l'infuence sociale (facteur proche de la perception des normes par rapport au transfert).…”