EFFECT OF A BLENDED LEARNING MODEL TO DEVELOP ETHICS COMPETENCE ON THE KNOWLEDGE OF PHYSIOTHERAPY STUDENTS TOWARDS LEARNING PROFESSIONAL ETHICS

Introduction. In the university context, analysing and developing student's knowledge towards the subject becomes fundamental, in order to promote student commitment and thus to the practice of an ethically responsible profession. The objectives of this project were: 1) To determine students' knowledge towards their education in professional ethics, before starting the study; 2) To develop ethical competence by means of the proposed model; 3) To analyse whether there is a positive change of knowledge at the end of the semester. Methods. A quasi-experimental design was performed. Subjects were randomly assigned to an experimental group or to a control group. Knowledge towards professional ethics was compared pre and post-test. Informed consent was obtained. A blended learning model to teach professional ethics, associated to the clinical internship, was specially worked out for the students of the third course of the Physiotherapy degree signed up in the mandatory subject Clinical Training III. A special syllabus to be studied online was elaborated, as well as workgroups were prepared to perform in the classroom to discuss special ethical issues detected along practices with real patients and real work setting. Experimental group followed the new methodology, while control group performed their practices as usual. Non-parametric tests were used to check changes in knowledge. Results. Results showed significant statistical differences between measure 1 (1,11 +/- 0,28) and 2 (2,25 +/- 0,34), between 2 (2,25 +/- 0,34) and 3(2,53 +/- 0,29), and between 1 (1,11 +/- 0,28) and 3(2,53 +/- 0,29) only in the experimental group (p<0,05). There were no differences in the control group. Discussion. Students' perceptions about knowledge they acquired towards professional ethics improved significantly with respect to the first measure of experimental group. In contrast, this did not occur in the control group, where data remained similar to pre-test and post-test 1. Nevertheless, experimental group showed an improvement in more than half of items with regard to the second measure. Conclusions. The student's knowledge towards their education in professional ethics is scarce, before starting the study. The blended training model of teaching-learning about professional ethics associated with clinical practice, designed for this study, develops ethical competence in Physiotherapy students. Learning professional ethics by means of the proposed training model improves Physiotherapy students' knowledge towards their training in this subject.