An Educational Video to Improve Healthcare Professionals' Knowledge in Cognitive Screening

Abstract

Background: Alzheimer’s dementia affects approximately 6.8 million Americans, which is expected to increase exponentially by mid-century as our older adult population grows (“2021 Alzheimer’s disease facts and figures,” 2021). Over the last two decades, Alzheimer-related deaths have increased by 145%, making it the fifth leading cause of death in adults aged 65 and older (“2021 Alzheimer’s disease facts and figures,” 2021). Yet, in 2020, only 53% of primary care providers (PCPs) surveyed reported that they routinely screen for cognitive impairment (“2021 Alzheimer’s disease facts and figures,” 2021; Jacobson, M., Thunell, J. & Zissimopoulos, J., 2020). The lack of screening using objective instruments was identified as a contributing factor to missed and delayed diagnosis of cognitive impairment in primary care settings (“2021 Alzheimer’s disease facts and figures,” 2021).Purpose: This scholarly project aims to evaluate the effectiveness of an educational video on improving health care providers (HCPs) knowledge in screening for cognition at a privately-owned primary care practice. Methods: The ACT on Alzheimer’s video, “Introduction to Cognitive Screening Administration and Scoring,” was implemented as a single educational session at a primary care clinic in Virginia Beach, Virginia. A pretest and posttest questionnaire were administered to determine if the educational video impacted the HCPs knowledge of cognitive screening. Results: All HCPs invited participated in this project (n = 8). Seven posttest surveys were returned without missing data. While participants’ scores increased after watching the video, the findings of this study only partially supported the ACT on Alzheimer’s video as an effective method for improving HCPs knowledge of cognitive screening techniques and tools. Unfortunately, this study did not confirm a causal relationship between the educational video and enhancing HCPs understanding of the USPSTFs recommendations for routine cognitive screening in the primary care setting. Conclusions: Although a small sample size considerably limited data analysis and failed to produce statistically significant differences in this project as a whole, HCPs significantly increased their knowledge of cognitive screening tools. Therefore, some components of the ACT on Alzheimer’s video proved to be an effective way to educate HCPs on the characteristics of the different screening instruments.