Experiences in Teaching and LearningEffects of Ebola Virus Disease education on student health professionals
Section snippets
Background and purpose
Ebola Virus Disease (EVD), also known as Ebola Hemorrhagic Fever or simply Ebola, is a fatal disease. Ebola virus outbreaks are found sporadically in many African countries.1 EVD is transmitted through direct contact with blood or bodily fluids, contaminated objects, or infected animals. EVD symptoms can appear anywhere from 2 to 21 days after exposure to EVD and include fever, muscle pain, diarrhea, vomiting, and unexplained hemorrhage.1 There is no current vaccine for EVD, and standard
Design
Due to the design and scope of this study, it was granted exempt status by the Shenandoah University IRB committee. The study consisted of a cross-sectional survey and a training intervention. The survey was administered pre- and post-intervention to measure the effect of training on the participant's knowledge and perception of EVD. A total of 550 students (390 pharmacy students, 110 nursing students, 50 physician assistant students) were eligible to complete the pre- and post-survey. The
Findings
Of the 550 eligible students, 269 participants completed a questionnaire, including 221 pharmacy students, 22 physician assistant students, and 26 nursing students (response rate 48.9%). Table 1 shows students’ characteristics by disciplines. Compared to pharmacy students and physician assistant students, there were significantly fewer male nursing students (p < 0.01). When compared by age, there were no significant differences between pharmacy students, physician assistant students, and
Discussion
Knowledge about how EVD is transmitted and treated has a direct impact on the safety of healthcare professionals and is critical to educating the community and preventing the spread of the disease.16
Ahmad et al.17 demonstrated that EVD training for health professionals in India improves scores on EVD assessments, but this is the first study the authors are aware of that evaluated student health professionals in the United States. Our survey used fact-based questions about how EVD is
Summary
The EBV educational intervention provided a significant increase in the knowledge of student healthcare professionals. Pharmacy students saw a significant change in their attitudes and perceptions of the EVD virus, while nursing and physician assistant students did not. Further development of educational interventions could be particularly useful for graduate schools to meet current guidelines and increase knowledge of students to better prepare them for practice. This educational intervention
Conflicts of interest
None.
Disclosure statements
None.
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2021, Journal of Professional NursingCitation Excerpt :Neither is there consensus over whether such education should be formally incorporated into degree programmes. Nevertheless, the authors have sought to define the professional skills that nursing students need to acquire in order to be prepared for a health emergency of the kind we are currently facing, since the majority of studies include an evaluation of students' knowledge, skills and attitudes towards caring for infected patients (Chilton et al., 2016; Choi & Kim, 2016; Elrggal et al., 2018; Etokidem et al., 2018; Ferranti et al., 2016; Kim & Choi, 2016; Patel et al., 2018; Wu et al., 2009). Given the growing number of pandemics that have been declared a PHEIC in recent years, it may be that this knowledge and these skills should be incorporated as core components of nurse education programmes.
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