Global e-Learning in Early Nutrition and Lifestyle for International Healthcare Professionals: Design and Evaluation of the Early Nutrition Specialist Programme (ENS).

Brigitte Brands,Berthold Koletzko,Martin R Fischer,Erin Baudendistel-Happ,Marina Sanchez-Garcia,Ngoc Nhan Tran

doi:10.3390/nu13030775

Abstract

Background: Every encounter a healthcare professional has with new or expecting parents offers an opportunity for addressing improved early nutrition and lifestyle. Evidence-based qualification programmes via e-learning offer valuable tools for attenuating the world’s huge double burden of both under- and overnutrition in early childhood. We evaluated use and learner satisfaction of a global e-learning programme on early nutrition and lifestyle addressing international healthcare professionals. Methods: We implemented the Early Nutrition Specialist Programme (ENS) with six interactive e-learning courses on early nutrition building on more than ten years of experience with global e-learning platforms, expert knowledge and an international network in the subject field. We collected descriptive and explorative evaluation data on usage and learner satisfaction with a questionnaire and log data over three years among 4003 learners from 48 countries. Results: Results show high completion of the ENS programme, with 85.5% of learners finalizing the programme after enrollment into the first of six courses. Very good results were provided for learner satisfaction with the courses (96.7% of users), for increasing understanding of the topic (97.4%) and matching the indicated time investment (94.4%). Most predominant themes in the open text fields of user feedback questionnaires were “Increase interactivity or number of audio-visuals”, “Content suggestions or more examples” and “Technical (quality) issues or navigation problems”. Conclusions: The ENS programme evaluation shows high completion rates and level of satisfaction by learners from numerous countries. The different needs for Continuing Medical Education (CME) of healthcare professionals in diverse healthcare system settings can be met by a joint e-learning qualification programme. Further optimizations will be implemented based on user feedback. More research with a learning analytics approach may help to further identify the most effective and efficient didactic and pedagogic elements of e-learning.

Highlights

For the global population of children born today, the greatest life-long burden for health and quality of life arises from the rapidly increasing prevalence of non-communicable disease (NCD, e.g., obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, lifestyle-related cancers, and others), and from the increasing sociodemographic disparities of disease risks
Capitalizing from nearly ten years of generating and conducting e-learning programmes at a global scale, we developed a highly interactive Continuing Medical Education (CME) accredited e-learning qualification programme entitled “The Early Nutrition Specialist (ENS)” for international healthcare professionals in three different languages (English, Spanish, French)
The Early Nutrition Specialist Programme (ENS) programme capitalizes from more than ten years’ experience in conceptualization, implementation and execution of e-learning platforms and courses, including the Early Nutrition eAcademy (ENeA; >12,000 users, 173 countries, 4 languages including English, Mandarin Chinese, Spanish and Turkish), dedicated e-learning programmes addressing Southeast Asia and Southern Africa and others, and an international network of collaborating experts on research and healthcare related to the subject field

Summary

Introduction

For the global population of children born today, the greatest life-long burden for health and quality of life arises from the rapidly increasing prevalence of non-communicable disease (NCD, e.g., obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, lifestyle-related cancers, and others), and from the increasing sociodemographic disparities of disease risks. Educational research indicates that implementation of e-learning programmes, in the field of Continuing Medical Education (CME), offer a variety of benefits such as flexibility with time and space, cost effectiveness, the opportunity to take individual learner differences into account and allow for self-pacing [3,4,5]. Capitalizing from nearly ten years of generating and conducting e-learning programmes at a global scale, we developed a highly interactive CME accredited e-learning qualification programme entitled “The Early Nutrition Specialist (ENS)” for international healthcare professionals in three different languages (English, Spanish, French). We evaluated use and learner satisfaction of a global e-learning programme on early nutrition and lifestyle addressing international healthcare professionals. Methods: We implemented the Early Nutrition Specialist Programme (ENS) with six interactive e-learning courses on early nutrition building on more than ten years of experience with global e-learning platforms, expert knowledge and an international network in the subject field. More research with a learning analytics approach may help to further identify the most effective and efficient didactic and pedagogic elements of e-learning

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion