Nurses’ Attitudes toward, and Needs for Online Learning: Differences between Rural and Urban Hospitals in Shanghai, East China

Abstract

Health professionals need continuing education to maintain their qualifications and competency. Online learning increases the accessibility and flexibility of continuing education. Assessment of nurses’ attitudes toward, and needs for, online learning can provide suggestions regarding learning program design and delivery. This study aimed to evaluate Chinese nurses’ attitudes toward, and needs for, online learning, and to explore the differences in attitudes and needs between nurses working in rural and urban hospitals. This work is a secondary analysis of a multicenter cross-sectional study conducted in Shanghai in 2015 (n = 550). Multiple regression techniques were used to determine the factors associated with nurses’ attitudes toward, and needs for, online learning. Results showed that nurses in rural hospitals had more positive attitudes toward online learning (102.7 ± 14.2) than those in urban hospitals (98.3 ± 12.9) (p < 0.001). For rural hospitals, nurses who could use computers and access the internet in their workplace reported more positive attitudes than those who could not. For urban hospitals, nurse educators showed significantly more positive attitudes than others. Communication skills (86.5%) and patient education (86.3%) were the most commonly-reported learning needs for nurses regardless of their working settings. Chinese nurses were willing to adopt online learning as a continuing education method. Nurses working in rural hospitals displayed more positive attitudes toward, and needs for, online learning than those working in urban hospitals. Nursing educators and managers should develop online learning programs and provide appropriate support to fulfill nurses’ learning needs, especially for those working in rural healthcare settings.

E-learning: who uses it and what difference does it make?

“…Those from disadvantaged areas are statistically over-represented in rural and remote regions (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2000), and as many of these learners face logistical problems in accessing face-to-face education (Riley and Schmidt, 2016;Sinclair et al, 2016), there is a greater interest in e-learning . In their study of 550 nurses in China, those in rural areas demonstrated more positive attitudes to, and a greater need for, e-learning (Xing et al, 2018).…”

Improvement of Knowledge and Caring Behavior Through E-Learning

“…Teaching can be delivered at the same time (synchronously) or at different times (asynchronously) (12). Xing et al, (2018) states that e-learning is considered one of the right alternatives for learning while working (13). Arkorful (2014) shows there are several benefits of using e-learning which is low-cost, promoting independent learning, flexible as participants can learn anytime and anywhere, increasing knowledge through interactive learning, effectively motivating participants to discuss the materials with other participants as well as lecturers, accessible as participants can download materials and learn the material again (14).…”

“…In the end, it is found that e-learning can effectively enhance nurses' skill in studying neurological problems. Xing et al, (2018) in his research stated that e-learning improves the accessibility and flexibility of nurses, making nurses helpful to keep studying. This is because during this time lack of nurses such as high workloads and lack of time prevented nurses from learning (13).…”

Development, implementation and evaluation of a management specialization course in oncology using blended learning

“…The wide use of distance education as a strategy in the continuing education of professionals has successfully increased access to information and democratized education [14]. Indeed, thanks to technological innovations, distance education has been helping individuals already in the job market deal with the disadvantages of distance and time limitations [15].…”