Knowledge Exchange Institute for Geriatric Nursing, Medical & Social Work Education
Knowledge Exchange Institute for Geriatric Nursing, Medical & Social Work Education Enhancing Canadian Gerontological Education Lynn McCleary, Peter Donahue, Tricia Woo, Veronique Boscart and Katherine McGilton Lynn McCleary, Associate Professor, Department of Nursing, Brock University; Peter Donahue, Associate Professor, School of Social Work, Renison University College, University of Waterloo; Tricia Woo, Associate Professor, Faculty of Health Sciences, McMaster University; Veronique Boscart, Post-doctoral Fellow, Toronto Rehabilitation Institute; Katherine McGilton, Senior Scientist, Toronto Rehabilitation Institute & Associate Professor, University of Toronto
Despite evidence that care of older persons is the core business of health care, in Canada, as elsewhere, there is limited capacity for gerontology education in nursing, medicine, and social work, with limited clinical learning opportunities, a dearth of gerontology courses, and a lack of interest in gerontology by students nearing graduation (Baumbusch & Andrusyszyn, 2002; Diachun, Hillier, & Stolee, 2006; Mellor & Solomon, 1995). Contributing to this problem is a lack of faculty with advanced gerontology or geriatrics training and education, meaning that gerontology content is taught by non-experts who need support to include the best evidence in their teaching.
We addressed this problem at the Canadian Knowledge Exchange Institute for Geriatric Nursing, Medical & Social Work Education, held May 4-6 2011 at Brock University in St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada. The Knowledge Exchange Institute was an initiative of the National Initiative for Care of the Elderly (NICE). NICE is an international network of researchers, practitioners, students and older adults dedicated to improving the care of older adults, both in Canada and abroad through knowledge translation. One of NICE’s goals is to improve gerontological education curricula for health professionals and social workers.
The goal of the Knowledge Exchange Institute was to equip Canadian faculty and senior trainees to incorporate evidence based gerontology knowledge into education of nursing, medical, and social work students. The Knowledge Exchange Institute was based on a successful Institute we held for nursing faculty and trainees in 2009 (McCleary, McGilton, Boscart, & Oudshoorn, 2009) and the U.S. Geriatric Nursing Education Consortium project (American Association of Colleges of Nursing, 2009). There was a dual focus on equipping participants to both enhance their courses and influence their colleagues to enhance curriculum.
We used the Knowledge in Action Process Model (Graham et al., 2006), the knowledge translation model used by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR www.cihr-irsc.gc.ca/e/39033.html). According to this model, the knowledge creation process results in synthesized research findings such as systematic reviews and practice guidelines and other knowledge products, such as pocket guides produced by NICE (for examples, see www.nicenet.ca ). We told participants we would provide them with “so many resources and knowledge products you won’t believe it”, and we did. We gave them USB keys filled with research summaries, lecture notes, PowerPoint slides, case studies, and more. We also provided paper copies of examples of key knowledge products, demonstrated use of some of the knowledge products, and showed them websites and portals to teaching tools. A publicly accessible wiki created for the first Institute has links to most of these resources (https://kumu.brocku.ca/geriatricnursingeducation). We think many of them would be relevant for our U.K. colleagues and encourage readers to view it.
In the Knowledge in Action Process Model, knowledge is applied to practice in an action cycle. We took participants through the steps of the action cycle.
Select Knowledge and Match to Problem. Participants identified opportunities to enhance courses and curriculum. They completed a course mapping and curriculum mapping exercise before they attended, comparing one course they taught and their program curriculum to core gerontological competencies. This prepared participants to select personally relevant knowledge products.
Adapt Knowledge to Local Context. Participants worked on a plan to select and adapt relevant knowledge products for their course. They also identified knowledge products that could be used to enhance gerontological content of courses taught by other members of their departments and schools.
Assess Barriers and Facilitators to Knowledge Use. Interactive sessions focussed on assessing and planning strategies for five key stakeholders for curriculum enhancement (clinical and practice faculty; clinical and practice settings; students; faculty; and Deans or Directors).
Select, Tailor, and Implement Interventions to Incorporate the Knowledge in Practice. Participants left with preliminary plans for enhancing their courses and influencing their colleagues. They set three specific goals for next steps towards enhancing gerontological content in their programs.
The last steps in the action cycle are: monitoring knowledge use; evaluating outcomes; and sustaining knowledge use. Participants will be contacted in six months with encouragement to continue with their plans. They will be contacted in one year for an evaluation of the extent to which they used the knowledge products.
