Meeting the Clinical Education Needs of Community-Based Preceptors: An Environmental Scan to Identify Format and Content for a New Web-Based Resource

Abstract

This study gathered world-wide information about web-based clinical teaching resources, identified gaps in these resources, and analyzed preceptor clinical education needs as first steps in creating a series of web-based clinical education modules. In addition to an environmental scan of web-based resources, a needs assessment survey was created, distributed, and analyzed. Participants in the survey, representing ten healthcare professions throughout British Columbia, Canada, identified the content that would be most relevant to them and the optimal length of web-based modules. The study identified 15 web-based clinical education topics common across four English-speaking countries and linked them to 31 province-wide learning needs surveyed across ten categories of allied health professionals. The results indicated a strong interest among preceptors in using a web-based resource and provided initial groundwork about the topical content and structural formats for the next phase of the project which will be to develop and evaluate a series of web-based clinical teaching modules.