Online food allergy and anaphylaxis education for school personnel is effective and scalable: experience with the allergyaware e-learning portal from 2015 to 2022.
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BACKGROUND: Providing training to school personnel on how to prevent, recognize, and manage anaphylaxis is critical. Asynchronous e-learning (where instructional material is available on-demand) may be well-suited to help with the implementation, scale, and dissemination of this training. In this paper, we report on the design, pilot testing, widespread implementation, and evaluation of an online course for school personnel. METHODS: Best practices in evidence-based instructional design for e-learning were incorporated into the course. Content was based on consensus guidelines and reviewed by experts. Initial pilot testing demonstrated large gains in post-course knowledge and self-confidence, as well as several suggestions for improvement. A website was developed to facilitate self-enrolment and delivery of the course modules in 2015 and has since been freely available. RESULTS: From 2015 to 2022 there have been over 170,000 course completions, with over one quarter of users completing the course more than once. Most completions occur at the start of the school year in the month of September. The median time to completion was about 25–30 min. Post-course participant self-reported confidence with epinephrine auto-injectors (EAIs) and emergency management of anaphylaxis was very high, and over 95% of participants would recommend the course to others. The average score on the 10-item post-course quiz was 9.05, with a pass rate of over 95%. CONCLUSIONS: The AllergyAware e-learning course for school personnel is highly satisfactory to users, with high post-course quiz performance and self-reported confidence in anaphylaxis management. It provides a scalable and accessible approach to training school personnel on this critical topic. Future research is needed to assess participants’ application of knowledge in real-world settings. TRIAL REGISTRY: The Hamilton Integrated Research Ethics Board reviewed the study protocol and granted exemption from full review per their review process, as this was considered a quality improvement initiative.
