​​​​​​​Is there a need for elearning veterinary continuing education?

Summary of work: The Authors decided to establish cooperation for the use of eLearning-techniques in veterinary continuing education. A survey was carried out to learn about the veterinarians’ use of computers and need for eLearning. About 2000 veterinarians in Lower Saxony were informed about the survey by the German veterinary journal. They could complete the questionnaire online, per fax or per mail and 212 veterinarians responded.

Summary of results: A Non-Response-Bias-Test showed no significant differences between early and late respondents. The major ways of training were journals (92.45%), congresses (81.13%) and the internet (52.83%). The number of continuing education activities veterinarians are involved in per year varies (one or less 14.62%, two 27.83%, three 23.11%, more than three 29.25%). Reasons for not attending an interesting event are: too expensive fees (72.17%) or travel costs (53.77%), too long journeys (41.51%), too little time for the family (35.38%) or the need for a practice stand-in (21.23). An alternative could be the use of eLearning: 42.45% would prefer to learn like this, 34.91% would like to try it and only 10.85% do not want to use it at all. So far only 26.42% have used eLearning.

Conclusions: The results of the survey show the advantages and use of eLearning in continuing veterinary education. The next step of the cooperation will be the creation of an eLearning-platform in Germany.