The Development of Brief Educational Modules for Social Determinants of Health

Social determinants of health (SDOH), the nonmedical factors influencing patients across individual and systematic levels, are essential to comprehensive healthcare. However, there is varied guidance in exactly how it should be taught or assessed in physician assistant (PA) programs, as well as what methodologies are effective or preferred by students.

A between-and-within groups study was designed for first-year PA students to evaluate their opinions, confidence levels, and comfort regarding SDOH delivered by 2 brief educational modules (one using an expert panel and the other a gamified approach).

A total of 48 students participated in the study. Results found that students appreciated the importance of SDOH to patient care and valued the application of clinical and public health resources. Students' confidence and comfort levels regarding SDOH improved following each educational module ( P < .05 pre vs. post comparisons). Students valued modular approaches to learning SDOH and equally prefer the panel and game formats. Students ranked direct clinical care as their highest preference in how they would prefer SDOH principles to be taught, followed by case-based learning, panel-based, and gamified-based approaches. Online learning was the least preferred teaching method.

These results suggest (1) modular approaches may be an effective means to teach SDOH, (2) SDOH could be taught longitudinally across the curriculum to reinforce understanding, and (3) delivery of SDOH curricula in PA education could consider nontraditional formats that promote interactive learning.