Prosthetists' perceptions and use of outcome measures in clinical practice: Long-term effects of focused continuing education.
Brian J Hafner, Susan E Spaulding, Rana Salem and 3 others
PMID 27638012WHAT IT FOUND
Prosthetists' confidence using the TUG and AMP did not significantly change between immediately after a 3-hour course and follow-up.
More reported routine use than before training, but this was a self-report survey.
Key findings
01Prosthetists' confidence administering the TUG and AMP did not change significantly between immediately after training and follow-up.
02At follow-up, 24.2% routinely used the TUG and 40.9% the AMP; before training, 3.0% and 16.7% did.
03Non-routine users reported more barriers: 45.9% said integrating outcome measures was quite a bit or very difficult, versus 20.7% of routine users.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they found
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What it does not show
The study surveyed prosthetists, not physical therapists, occupational therapists, or speech-language pathologists, so it does not show what those clinicians should do. It was a self-report survey with no control group, so changes over time cannot be confidently attributed to the continuing education course alone. Only 66 of 79 prior course participants responded, and although retention was 83.5%, non-respondents could have differed. Participants had chosen to take an outcomes-measurement course, so they may have been more motivated than prosthetists who did not seek such training. The course focused on performance-based measures, so the results may not apply to self-report outcome measures.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that the continuing education course caused long-term changes in outcome-measure use. The study had no control group, relied on self-reported surveys, and confidence did not change significantly from post-training to follow-up.