Midwives In Indonesia Research Articles

Improving Distance Learning of Midwives in Indonesia

A nalysis of data from West Java, Indonesia, from 25 community midwives who par ticipated in a distance learning programme in 1996 and 35 community midwives who did not participate showed that the distance learning trained community mid wives demonstrated significantly better knowledge than the untrained community midwives with a difference of the mean knowledge scores of 24.5 (p < 0.001). In con trast, the mean total skills score of the untrained community midwives (65.5) was slightly higher than the distance learning trained community midwives (63.8), but this difference was not statistically significant. Even when the analysis was restricted to midwives with two years experience, no difference in mean total skills scores was observed. However, the mean total skills score of the untrained community midwives dropped from 65.5 to 62.8, and for the distance learning trained community mid wives it increased from 63.8 to 64.8. The average number of deliveries were signi ficantly higher for the untrained community midwives (6.0) in comparison to this distance learning trained community midwives (3.0 p < 0.001). Some suggestions are given to improve quality of training and programme management, based on the fundings.