Electronic learning methods compared to traditional learning methods in anaesthesia education: a systematic review

The use of electronic or digital resources has been shown to be effective in improving knowledge retention and skills development through many fields of medical education. Few systematic reviews have studied the effects of electronic learning ('e-learning') compared to traditional learning methods in anaesthesia education. We conducted a systematic review of randomised controlled trials and prospective cohort studies assessing learning outcomes from e-learning modalities compared to 'traditional', face-to-face or didactic teaching methods.

Medical databases (MEDLINE, EMBASE, ERIC, Scopus, CENTRAL, Google Scholar) were searched for applicable studies from January 2002 to January 2023 on the 12th of February 2023. Studies comparing an 'e-learning arm' against a 'traditional learning' arm including anaesthetic doctors of any level within the study population were considered and assessed for inclusion. The systematic review tool Covidence™ was utilised to track studies for inclusion, results were synthesised be each reviewer prior to independent assessment for risk of bias using the Cochrane Risk of Bias assessment tool 'RoB-2'.

Our search strategy identified 1681 papers for review. Thirteen studies were deemed eligible for inclusion, assessing 572 health practitioners at varying stages of their clinical careers. Four eligible studies showed a statistically significant difference in their primary outcomes favouring e-learning, while one study found e-learning non-inferior to traditional learning. Three studies found a statistically significant change in favour of traditional learning and the remaining five studies did not find a significant difference when comparing e-learning and traditional learning. Qualitative analysis of various secondary outcomes (where applicable) found considerable variation regarding participant preference in favour of both traditional and e-learning models.

E-learning is an important adjunct to traditional learning methods and when undertaken in the appropriate clinical teaching context, outcomes from e-learning programs can outperform those from traditional learning methodologies. However, there is considerable heterogeneity in the research and shows no consistent benefit to either e-learning or traditional learning. Further research is required to explore the most effective teaching contexts and the efficient implementation of different e-learning modalities in anaesthesia.

This systematic review was registered prospectively with PROSPERO (reference: CRD42023399129). ( https://www.crd.york.ac.uk/PROSPERO/view/CRD42023399129 ). TWITTER: https://x.com/abcsofa .