Health promotion by increasing knowledge about child protection: Disseminating of the contents from an online course to health professionals

Abstract

Background: The prevalence of child maltreatment (child abuse) in Germany is persistently high and one of the main causes of health inequalities and social injustice. Health professionals are important in recognizing and dealing with child maltreatment, so comprehensive continuing education on the subject is important. The online course “Child Protection in Medicine” was evaluated positively but it became clear that many participants were unable to complete the course due to time constraints. To train as many health professionals as possible on the subject of child protection, additional materials to disseminate the most important contents of the course were developed. Objectives: This paper presents the evaluation of the dissemination materials and points out further steps in this direction. Materials and methods: The dissemination materials are available to all graduates of the online course. For all materials there is a methodological guide to make the implementation easy. The materials can be evaluated online afterwards. Results: In all, 55 of 1305 graduates used and evaluated the dissemination materials as multipliers. A high level of satisfaction with the materials was revealed across all professional groups. Both theoretical and practical knowledge in child protection could be imparted. The majority also stated that without the materials, no dissemination measures would have taken place. Discussion: In the future, even more graduates should be motivated to use and evaluate the materials. The online course can thus serve as multiplier training and support the implementation of in-house training. Thus, knowledge about child protection in medicine can be disseminated widely.