Use of the Internet and electronic databases

The availability of accessible, fast internet connections for rural and remote health professionals has done wonders to reduce professional isolation.  CUCRH has been involved in two projects to improve the effectiveness of these services.

Awareness, access and use of Clinical Information Access on-Line

In 2004 CUCRH conducted an evaluation of the Clinical Information Access Online service for Information Resources of the Health Department of WA. This is a state-wide service that makes on-line resources such as journals, reference books and searchable databases available to all state health employees via a password authorised internet connection. We were pleased to see from the evaluation that the most significant levels of CIAO service awareness and access were amongst rural health professionals.

Our evaluation found the CIAO service was a very important source of health information for employees. The most significant finding was that 31% of employees surveyed had used the service and that 40% of those users utilized the service more than monthly. Users accessed it primarily for keeping up to date, for research and for patient care. The final report can be viewed here .

A training evaluation

A major CUCRH initiative in 2001 trained rural health professionals to be more efficient in their use of information technology. Senior Project Officer Dr Peter Shaw worked closed with UWA Medical Librarian Sandra Pullman to assess the needs of health professionals and then developed and delivered a training package to health professionals in the CUCRH catchment, which was responsive to the identified needs and based on adult learning principles.  Training modules included a theory and a practical component. Pre-training and post-training questionnaires have been administered to collect data from participants about their perceptions of changes in their confidence and skill in the use of the Internet and electronic databases.  Workshop topics delivered include effective and efficient searching of the Internet, effective and efficient searching of health databases such as Medline and CINAHL, effective and efficient database searching to improve evidenced based practice and effective and efficient searching in an area of professional interest.  Workshops were delivered in Karratha, Port Hedland, Morawa, Meekatharra, Dongara, Carnarvon, Exmouth and Geraldton.  150 health professionals participated, representing all health disciplines.  An evaluation of the training has been published in Focus on Health Professional Education: a Multi-Disciplinary Journal (Shaw and Pullman 2003).