The impact of educational interventions for health professionals on stroke patient care: an integrative review

Abstract

Introduction:

The National Stroke Strategy, and the development of the Stroke-Specific Education Framework, emphasised the need for a skilled and knowledgeable workforce. The Francis and Keogh reports highlighted the importance of on-going continuing professional development. However, key policies do not cite explicit evidence of the value of education and training. This study aimed to systematically review the literature exploring the impact of healthcare professional education and training on the process and outcome of stroke patient care.

Methods:

An integrative review approach was used to summarise the literature. A search strategy including the MeSH terms stroke, education and health personnel was developed and adapted to search bibliographic databases. The search strategy's quality was tested using backwards and forwards citation searches. Results were screened on title, abstract, and full paper. Systematic data extraction and synthesis were conducted.

Results:

Following screening, 23 studies met the inclusion criteria. Staff group varied: pre-hospital staff (n=4), healthcare assistants, student nurses and nurses (n=10), multi-disciplinary teams (n=8), pharmacists (n=1); as did settings; pre-hospital and hyperacute (n=7), acute and rehabilitation (n=15), and community (n=1). The majority, 17 studies, demonstrated that education and training had a positive impact on a range of patient and process outcomes, however, methodological quality was variable ranging from single centre observational studies to cluster RCTs.

Conclusion:

Robust studies are needed to explore the impact of stroke education and training of health care staff on patient care so that investment in education and training can be more clearly linked to optimum health outcomes