Mental Health Issues Among Farmers: An Online Continuing Education Program for Nurses

An asynchronous online continuing education (CE) program was created to increase nurses' awareness and knowledge of occupationally related mental health issues among farmers.

The ADDIE (analysis, design, development, implementation, evaluation) model was followed to create the CE program. Articulate Storyline 3 (Articulate 360), a software tool, was used to build an interactive, e-learning, and virtual training module.

The course was completed by 113 nurses. Eighty-two (72.5%) of these nurses completed the course evaluation. Of these, 69 (84.1%) reported that the course met their expectations. The majority of respondents indicated that the material was presented in a clear, organized manner (80.0%, n = 80) and that all course objectives were met, including being able to identify sources of stress among farmers (86.3%, n = 80), recognize manifestations of stress among farmers (86.4%, n = 81), understand farmers' mental health status (86.3%, n = 80), and identify mental health nursing practices (87.3%, n = 79).

Nurses can provide more salient care to the farming population when they are equipped with an understanding of the culture and stress associated with farming. This online educational program has the potential to improve mental health care for farmers and their families. [.