Mental Health Research and Treatment Center (FBZ), Faculty of Psychology, Ruhr University Bochum, Bochum, Germany.
German Center for Mental Health (DZPG), Bochum-Marburg, Germany.
J Med Internet Res. 2024 Nov 27;26:e54176. doi: 10.2196/54176.
Clinical diagnoses determine if and how therapists treat their patients. As misdiagnoses can have severe adverse effects, disseminating evidence-based diagnostic skills into clinical practice is highly important.
This study aimed to develop and evaluate a blended learning course in a multicenter cluster randomized controlled trial.
Undergraduate psychology students (N=350) enrolled in 18 university courses at 3 universities. The courses were randomly assigned to blended learning or traditional synchronous teaching. The primary outcome was the participants' performances in a clinical diagnostic interview after the courses. The secondary outcomes were diagnostic knowledge and participants' reactions to the courses. All outcomes were analyzed on the individual participant level using noninferiority testing.
Compared with the synchronous course (74.6% pass rate), participation in the blended learning course (89% pass rate) increased the likelihood of successfully passing the behavioral test (odds ratio 2.77, 95% CI 1.55-5.13), indicating not only noninferiority but superiority of the blended learning course. Furthermore, superiority of the blended learning over the synchronous course could be found regarding diagnostic knowledge (β=.13, 95% CI 0.01-0.26), course clarity (β=.40, 95% CI 0.27-0.53), course structure (β=.18, 95% CI 0.04-0.32), and informativeness (β=.19, 95% CI 0.06-0.32).
Blended learning can help to improve the diagnostic skills and knowledge of (future) clinicians and thus make an important contribution to improving mental health care.
ClinicalTrials.gov NCT05294094; https://clinicaltrials.gov/study/NCT05294094.
临床诊断决定了治疗师是否以及如何治疗他们的患者。由于误诊可能会产生严重的不良后果，因此将基于证据的诊断技能传播到临床实践中非常重要。
本研究旨在通过多中心集群随机对照试验开发和评估一种混合学习课程。
本科心理学学生（N=350）在 3 所大学的 18 门大学课程中注册。课程被随机分配到混合学习或传统同步教学中。主要结局是课程结束后参与者在临床诊断访谈中的表现。次要结局是诊断知识和参与者对课程的反应。所有结局均在个体参与者水平上使用非劣效性检验进行分析。
与同步课程（74.6%的通过率）相比，参与混合学习课程（89%的通过率）增加了成功通过行为测试的可能性（优势比 2.77，95%CI 1.55-5.13），表明混合学习课程不仅不劣于而且优于同步课程。此外，与同步课程相比，混合学习课程在诊断知识（β=0.13，95%CI 0.01-0.26）、课程清晰度（β=0.40，95%CI 0.27-0.53）、课程结构（β=0.18，95%CI 0.04-0.32）和信息性（β=0.19，95%CI 0.06-0.32）方面也具有优势。
混合学习可以帮助提高（未来）临床医生的诊断技能和知识，从而为改善精神卫生保健做出重要贡献。
ClinicalTrials.gov NCT05294094；https://clinicaltrials.gov/study/NCT05294094。
