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Promoting oral cancer examinations to medical primary care providers: a cluster randomized trial
Author(s) -
Wee Alvin G.,
Zimmerman Lani M.,
Anderson James R.,
Nunn Martha E.,
Loberiza Fausto R.,
Sitorius Michael A.,
Pullen Carol H.
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
journal of public health dentistry
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.64
H-Index - 63
eISSN - 1752-7325
pISSN - 0022-4006
DOI - 10.1111/jphd.12161
Subject(s) - medicine , intervention (counseling) , family medicine , randomized controlled trial , primary care , cluster (spacecraft) , physical therapy , nursing , computer science , programming language
Objectives To compare the percentage of patients who had an oral cancer examination (OCE) by their primary care provider (PCP) in medical clinics participating in a web‐based education with poster reminder intervention to that of patients in control clinics. To also determine the effects for PCPs in medical clinics participating in the web‐based education with poster reminder intervention as compared with those in control clinics regarding: a) index of knowledge of oral cancer risk factors (RiskOC) and b) index of knowledge of oral cancer diagnostic procedures (DiagOC). Methods Six medical clinics were recruited to participate in this study and randomly assigned to an intervention group or a control group. PCPs (physicians, physician assistants, and advanced practice registered nurses) took a pretest; 2 weeks later, they participated in the web‐based educational program, including a posttest (intervention group) or took a posttest only (control group). In each clinic, 1 week following completion of the PCPs' posttests, 94 patients were recruited to complete a one‐page survey. Results The intervention clinics were found to be a significant factor for the PCPs to perform patient OCEs, after controlling for significant covariates, that is, age, main reason for clinic visit, OCE for patient in the past year, clinic's mean DiagOC score, and clinic's mean RiskOC score. The intervention also resulted in the PCPs increasing their pretest to posttest RiskOC scores. Conclusions The use of intervention has the potential to increase PCPs' short‐term knowledge and to increase the frequency of PCPs' routine, nonsymptomatic opportunistic OCE on patients.