INJURY PREVENTION TRAINING - IS IT EFFECTIVE

The aim of this controlled follow-up study was to assess the effective ness of a multi-disciplinary training programme in increasing knowledg e, changing attitudes and practice in injury prevention amongst primar y health care professionals. All primary health care team members in N ottinghamshire were invited to participate in the training programme. Thirty-one health visitors, 11 general practitioners and 16 practice n urses attended the training programme, and completed the study questio nnaire 3-4 months before and after the training. A comparison was made with a professional of the same status, who had not attended the trai ning session who had also completed both questionnaires, and who was m atched with a trained participant on the basis of pre-training attitud e and knowledge scores (to within 1 point of each score). A significan t increase in the number of individuals answering correctly to questio ns on accidental injury epidemiology was demonstrated in the trained g roup (Wilcoxon matched-pairs signed rank, health visitors P = 0.002, p ractice nurses P = 0.0004, general practitioners P = 0.02), but no sig nificant change was demonstrated in the control group. Changes in atti tude scores were only significant for the practice nurses (Wilcoxon ma tched-pairs signed rank, P = 0.01). Increases were also demonstrated i n the frequency of health visitors identifying hazards on home visits and discussing them with parents (chi(2) = 6.19, d.f. = 2, P = 0.04) a nd in the number of health visitors who, on receiving notification of a child attending the A&E department following an injury, carried out a home visit to discuss injury prevention (chi(2) 9.19, d.f. = 2, P = 0.01). The number of general practitioners displaying posters in the s urgery waiting rooms also increased significantly (chi(2) = 9.21, d.f. = 2, P = 0.002). The number of contacts with representatives of other agencies and individuals concerning child safety significantly increa sed in the trained group (Wilcoxon matched-pairs, P = 0.02). We conclu de that education and training with regard to injury prevention was ef fective in increasing knowledge and some injury prevention practices. Although training did not appear to change the attitudes of health vis itors and general practitioners to a significant extent, a marked chan ge was unlikely due to high baseline attitude scores.