VARK preference and perception of online versus offline professional development training of medical laboratory technologists.

Abstract

This study aims to understand the learning preferences and perception of medical laboratory technologists on sudden shift from offline to online training sessions during COVID-19 pandemic. Microsoft form containing twenty-four questions was circulated to the twenty-five laboratory technologists after 1year of online continuous professional development training. VARK questionnaire was circulated to understand the learning style. Provision of recording lectures, significant reduction of performance anxiety, anxiety associated with criticism, and QA sessions emerged as the major positive aspects of a virtual training platform. Analysis of learning preferences revealed that most technologists had a unimodal aural (45%) or kinesthetics (33%) than visual (11%) and reading (11%) learning preference. In bimodal learning preference, AK (44.44%) emerged as the predominant form. Forty percent of the technologists showed trimodal learning pattern with 50% among them showing an ARK pattern while 25% each showing VAK and VRK patterns of learning preferences. Medical laboratory technologists adapted well to the sudden shift from offline to online continuous development programs. However, efficient managerial mechanisms to address the major perceived hurdles and designing a multimodal training module to accommodate the learning preferences of our technologists can ensure enthusiastic participation and effective learning among medical laboratory technologists.