Institute of Health Research, University of Health and Allied Sciences, Ho, PMB 31, Ho, Ghana.
BMC Med Educ. 2020 Nov 25;20(1):465. doi: 10.1186/s12909-020-02380-2.
Ghana is challenged with shortage of critical human resources for health particularly nurses and midwives in rural hard-to-reach communities. This shortage potentially hinders efforts towards attaining universal access to basic healthcare. More importantly, poor quality of pre-service training for health trainees has the potential to worsen this predicament. There is therefore the need to leverage emerging digital innovations like e-learning to complement existing efforts. This study was conducted several months before the outbreak of COVID-19 to investigate the preparedness, acceptability and feasibility e-learning innovation for nursing and midwifery trainees.
The study is a cross-sectional descriptive survey involving nursing and midwifery students (n = 233) in one of Ghana's public universities, located in the Volta region of Ghana. Simple random sampling technique was used to collect responses from eligible respondents using a structured questionnaire. Descriptive statistical analysis was done using STATA software (version 12.0).
It was found that nearly 100% of respondents owned smartphones that were used mostly for learning purposes including sharing of academic information. Over 70% of respondents particularly used social media, social networking applications and internet searches for learning purposes. Health trainees were however constrained by low bandwidth and lack of seamless internet connectivity within their learning environments to maximize the full benefits of these e-learning opportunities.
Respondents were predominantly prepared for an e-learning pilot project. These feability findings suggest e-learning is a huge potential that can be used to augment existing approaches for pre-service training of health trainees in Ghana, when implementation threats are sufficiently addressed. Compelling findings of this study are therefore timely to inform evidence-based policy decisions on innovative digitial solutions for pre-service training of health workforce even as the world adapts to the "new normal" situation induced by COVID-19.
加纳面临着卫生人力资源短缺的挑战，尤其是在农村偏远社区的护士和助产士。这种短缺可能会阻碍实现普及基本医疗保健的努力。更重要的是，卫生培训生的职前培训质量差有可能使这种困境恶化。因此，有必要利用新兴的数字创新，如电子学习，来补充现有的努力。这项研究是在 COVID-19 爆发前几个月进行的，旨在调查电子学习创新对护理和助产学员的准备情况、可接受性和可行性。
这是一项横断面描述性调查，涉及加纳一所公立大学的护理和助产学生（n=233），该大学位于加纳的沃尔特地区。使用简单随机抽样技术，从合格的受访者中使用结构化问卷收集答复。使用 STATA 软件（版本 12.0）进行描述性统计分析。
发现近 100%的受访者拥有智能手机，这些手机主要用于学习，包括学术信息的共享。超过 70%的受访者特别使用社交媒体、社交网络应用程序和互联网搜索来学习。然而，卫生培训生在学习环境中受到低带宽和无缝互联网连接的限制，无法充分利用这些电子学习机会的全部优势。
受访者主要为电子学习试点项目做好了准备。这些可行性研究结果表明，电子学习具有巨大的潜力，可以在解决实施威胁的情况下，用于补充加纳卫生培训生职前培训的现有方法。因此，这项研究的引人注目结果及时为循证决策提供了信息，即针对卫生劳动力的职前培训采用创新的数字解决方案，即使世界适应 COVID-19 引起的“新常态”情况。
