Opioid addiction is claiming lives at a staggering rate. It represents one of the most pressing public health emergencies facing American society today. Too many people are inappropriately prescribed opioids. When prescriptions are written, they are often for long durations that create opportunities for addiction.
Previous research in Amplifire revealed that a clinician’s year of medical school completion was highly correlated with their knowledge about opioids. In an effort to combat this issue, AHEC in Charlotte, North Carolina deployed the Opioid Safe Use and Management course, originally designed by Mass General Brigham, to 363 of their physicians.
Initial Knowledge (prior to learning)
This heatmap is taken from Amplifire’s reporting dashboard and shows the workforce sorted by their amounts of confidently held misinformation, uncertainty, and proficiency.
- 373 clinicians generated 9,325 data points
- 1,650 instances of confidently held misinformation were corrected
- 3,963 instances of uncertainty were corrected
- By the end of the course, 100% of the clinicians were proficient (both confident and correct) on all the material
- The most misinformed or uncertain physicians spent an average of 39 minutes in the platform, while those who were more proficient spent 27 minutes
Top 3 Take-aways by Topic
Amplifire categorizes clinician’s initial (pre-learning) misinformation, uncertainty, and proficiency by topic so administrators and educators can notice areas in which staff may put patients at risk. The topics below showed the highest levels of risk from misinformation.
Naloxone
17% of clinicians were initially misinformed and 39% were uncertain about the circumstances under which a naloxone rescue kit should be prescribed.
Risk
12% of clinicians were initially misinformed and 70% were uncertain about the strikingly different risk factors for misuse between male and female patients.
Scope / Epidemiology
16% of clinicians were initially misinformed and 68% were uncertain about the number of people who die from drug overdoses.
Clinical Implications
Download the full case study to see all of the findings and clinical implications.
