Low-vision education for the health care workforce: strategy to create a vision-friendly hosital

Aging of the baby boomers presents a unique set of challenges for health care workers. Low vision among patients may be a barrier to providing appropriate patient care, may impede communication, and may decrease patients' satisfaction with health care. It is important to train the medical workforce to understand the unique challenges of the aging population.

To test an interactive educational learning model targeting health care workers to improve knowledge and awareness of low vision.

Participants completed a survey prior to and after an educational intervention that consisted of 4 components: (1) normal aging, (2) eye-disease of the elderly, (3) experiential learning, and (4) written material with references and further resources.

Three hundred eight-six members of the hospital workforce completed the training. There was statistically significant improvement in 7 of the 8 test questions. One question demonstrated a positive trend but was not statistically significant.

An interactive educational model on low vision can improve the knowledge of the health care team. This may lead to improvement in patients' satisfaction and quality of care and help create a vision-friendly hospital.