PROFICIENCY ASSESSMENT: A TOOL FOR DEVELOPING GERIATRIC EDUCATION PROGRAMS AND FOR PREDICTING PROGRAM PARTICIPATION

Geriatric education centers are responsible for providing geriatric training opportunities that meet the needs of an interdisciplinary range of health care professionals. Proficiency assessment measures the discrepancy between what professionals perceive they do know and what they perceive they should know, and provides a tool for planning and predicting attendance at educational programs among such professionals. Implementation of a proficiency-assessment tool at the Ohio Valley Appalachia Regional (OVAR) Geriatric Education Center successfully identified 10 out of 27 items that predicted attendance at a selected geriatrics program. Techniques are suggested for instrument design and distribution, data collection, coding, and data analysis and interpretation.