Virtual Training of Medical Students to Promote the Comfort and Cooperation of Patients with Neurodevelopmental Disabilities.

Publisher: Springer Country of Publication: United States NLM ID: 7904301 Publication Model: Print-Electronic Cited Medium: Internet ISSN: 1573-3432 (Electronic) Linking ISSN: 01623257 NLM ISO Abbreviation: J Autism Dev Disord Subsets: MEDLINE

Publication: <2006- >: New York, NY : Springer
Original Publication: New York, Plenum Press.

Students, Medical* ; Autism Spectrum Disorder* ; Disabled Persons*; Humans ; Behavior Therapy ; Health Personnel

Patients with neurodevelopmental disabilities generally have less access to necessary medical care compared to those without disabilities. Barriers to adequate care include patient fear and uncooperative behavior during routine medical procedures and inadequate preparation of medical professionals to treat this population. Researchers have identified multiple behavior-analytic procedures for promoting comfort and cooperation during medical treatments. Efficient, cost-effective training programs are needed to widely disseminate behavior-analytic procedures to medical students and professionals. The purpose of this study was to assess the efficacy of a virtual training to prepare medical students to implement behavioral procedures that could be easily incorporated into typical wellness examinations. Seven medical students received behavioral skills training (BST) delivered remotely via the Internet. Results showed that the training successfully increased students' correct implementation of the procedures in roleplay with the experimenter and with patients with neurodevelopmental disabilities. Responding also maintained at high levels 2 weeks after the training. These findings suggest that virtual BST is an efficient, practical approach for training health care professionals to implement general behavior management strategies to increase the comfort and cooperation of patients with NDD.
(© 2023. The Author(s).)

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Keywords: Applied behavior analysis; Behavioral skills training; Intellectual and developmental disabilities; Medical professional training; Virtual training; Wellness examination

Date Created: 20230117 Date Completed: 20240401 Latest Revision: 20240401

20240401

PMC9844946

10.1007/s10803-023-05896-w

36648564