Abstract
Background: in physiotherapy, the interest in sonography education has been increasing in recent decades, giving rise to opportunities in education in an attempt to meet the elevated demand. In other health professions, online education has demonstrated to be of interest, and another possibility by which to obtain knowledge. Methods: this exploratory observational prospective study compared the outcomes between onsite versus online education, and was approved by the ethics committee of the Francisco de Vitoria University. Two groups (onsite and online) with 136 attendants and two levels for each (basic and advanced) received the same content but through different presentations. Theoretical exams were conducted via “Kahoot” and practical exams using phantoms, and the results were subject to statistical analyses. Results: the average age of onsite participants was 29.5 (25–35.25) years and 34 (28.5–40.5) for the online participants, with a higher percentage of women. The average score ranks in the Kahoot_basic test were higher for both online groups corresponding to basic (group 1) and advanced (group 2) levels: 7 (6.5, 7.5) for group 1 and 7 (6.5, 8.5) for group 2 vs. the onsite groups: 6 (5.5, 7) for group 1 and 6 (5, 6.5) for group 2. In the practical exam, the model detected that a small negative difference between the Onsite 2 group and the total effect (−1.23148, SE = 0.43687) was significant (t = −2.819, p = 0.00558) with a low effect size (R2adjusted = 0.025) for the measurements of the hollow structure; the difference between the Online 2 and Onsite 1 group was positive (1.5026, SE = 0.5822) and significant (t = 2.5809, p = 0.0113), with a low effect size (R2adjusted = 0.016) for the solid structure depth measurement. Conclusions: the results showed that there could be an opportunity to access sonography knowledge through online education in physical therapy compared to the traditional onsite model. These conclusions support the use of a low-cost and accessible method for ultrasound education.
Highlights
Clinical ultrasonography is used as an assessment tool for biofeedback [1,2] and echo-guided procedures [3,4] and diagnosis [5]
The results showed significant differences between some of the training groups and the outcome variables; it was confirmed that despite the weighted adjustment of the covariates, very large differences remained in the standardized mean difference (SMD), above the tolerable limit of 0.2, both between the covariables and between the groups; between the groups with the least differences between them (Onsite 1 and Onsite 2) no significant differences were detected in any of the outcome variables
The most important results from this study were those from the propensity analysis, which gave higher probability of obtaining better results in terms of theoretical as well as practical exams for both online groups compared to the traditional teaching groups
Summary
Clinical ultrasonography is used as an assessment tool for biofeedback [1,2] and echo-guided procedures [3,4] and diagnosis [5]. Some procedures in clinical practice are invasive (e.g., dry needling, electrolysis) and could be a source of bias [12,13]. These invasive procedures, when associated with diagnostic imaging, have been shown to reduce the risk of bias and improve patient experience [12]. Ultrasound training in physiotherapy has seen increased demand in several countries [14,15,16,17,18,19] along with the use of these invasive procedures. The validity of novice versus expertise in ultrasound training has been stablished (intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) > 0.9) [15,16], providing benefits for professionals and patients
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