Online nephrology course replacing a face to face course in nursing schoolsʹ bachelorʹs program: A prospective, controlled trial, in four Israeli nursing schools

SummaryBackground learning is growing rapidly worldwide, especially in the health related sectors such as medicine and nursing. Our trial wished to measure the objective (i.e. final exam results, courseware usage patterns) and subjective (satisfaction) efficiency of online vs. face-to-face learning in a prospective, controlled trial, a first of its kind in Israel. als and Methods ial tested a blended online course, teaching introduction to clinical nephrology. The course was filmed and edited into a learning platform to fit computer based learning. 90 nursing students, from 4 bachelorʹs nursing programs in Israel participated in the study. The intervention group included 32 students who studied using the online course, accompanied by 3 frontal meetings dealing with technical and content issues. The reference group included 58 students from 3 nursing programs, studying in a traditional face-to-face course. s nal exam results were significantly higher in the intervention group compared with the reference group (9.6 ± 2.57 vs. 8.4 ± 2.72; p < 0.05). Student satisfaction was very high in the intervention group: 97% thought the course was well organized, 100% thought the teacher taught clearly and consistently, 90% thought the teacher encouraged self-thinking,100% thought the teacher used clarifying examples, 91% thought the teaching aids helped the learning process and 97% thought the teaching method contributed to the learning process. erage usage of the online course was 4:10 h vs. 14 academic hours (10:30 h) in the traditional course. The daily usage habits of the courseware were also followed, indicating that most learning took place between 12 PM and 1 AM, peaking between 5 PM and 7 PM, and dipping between 3 AM and 10 AM. sions line course had higher efficiency compared to the traditional face-to-face course. The subjective feedback of the intervention group proves high satisfaction with online learning.