Evaluation of population health short courses: implications for developing and evaluating population health professional development initiatives

Abstract

Population health as an approach to planning is key to improving the health and well-being of whole populations and to reduce inequities within and between population groups. The Victorian Department of Health North and West Metropolitan Region, in collaboration with The University of Melbourne (School of Population Health), have delivered four annual population health short courses. The short courses were designed to equip participants with knowledge and skills to implement population health approaches upon their return to their workplaces. For three consecutive years, online surveys (n=41) and semi-structured interviews (n=35), underpinned by participatory and realist evaluation approaches, were conducted to obtain the perceptions and experiences of the population health short course participants. Evaluation findings indicate that participants' understanding of population health concepts increased; however, there were mixed outcomes in assisting participants' implementation of population health approaches upon their return to their workplaces. A core list of perceived requirements, enablers and barriers emerged at an individual, organisational and system level as influencing the capability of participants to implement population health approaches. Evaluation recommendations and actions taken to revise short course iterations are presented, providing evidence that the evaluation approaches were appropriate and increased the use of evaluation learnings. Implications of evaluation findings for professional development practice (i.e. shift from a 'Course' as a one-off event to a Population Health 'Program' of inter-dependent components) and evaluation (i.e. participatory realist evaluation approaches) are presented.

Preferred modalities for delivering continuing education to the public health workforce: a scoping review

“…We identified public health training programs delivered in over 11 countries: Australia, 10,16,17 Bolivia, 18 Brazil, 19 Canada, [20][21][22] Greece, 23 the Islamic Republic of Iran, 24 Mexico, 25 Rwanda, 26,27 Uganda, 28 the United Kingdom 29 and the United States of America (USA). [30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41][42][43][44][45] One program offered trainings in over 77 countries, 46 and another trained participants in Austria, Lithuania and the Netherlands.…”

“…Only eight studies included trainings where issues around equity, diversity and inclusion were part of the course content. 10,16,18,23,24,[35][36][37] Topics included reducing health inequities and instruction related to conducting research with vulnerable populations.…”

“…Approaches to evaluation included surveys; 26,27,38,42,43 pre/post questionnaires; 30,31,33,41 participant completion statistics; 19 interviews; 28,45 and mixed methods (a combination of either focus groups or interviews and surveys or questionnaires with participants). 9,10,[16][17][18][20][21][22][23][24][25]29,32,[34][35][36]39,40,44 Evaluations after participation captured participants' demographic information, subject knowledge before and after training, satisfaction with and post-training use of their newly gained knowledge.…”

“…22,36,46 When training did not take a practical approach, participants said the content was too focussed on theory and that they were not ready to apply the content in their workplace. 16,24,43 A commonly cited enabler to engaging with training content was the opportunity to meet colleagues within and outside of their organizations to discuss training materials. 17,18,22,24,36,46 Networking was perceived as a strong benefit of trainings that used this collaborative approach.…”

“…Some participants found it difficult to continually engage with material during long training programs. 10,16,37 One study noted that a year-long course had a high dropout rate. 28 Another study noted that participants preferred courses that were divided into shorter units.…”