title: Breakeven, cost benefit, cost effectiveness, and willingness to pay for web-based versus face-to-face education delivery for health professionals.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  The introduction of Web-based education and open universities has seen an increase in access to professional development within the health professional education marketplace. Economic efficiencies of Web-based education and traditional face-to-face educational approaches have not been compared under randomized controlled trial conditions.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  To compare costs and effects of Web-based and face-to-face short courses in falls prevention education for health professionals.
  
  
  METHODS
  We designed two short courses to improve the clinical performance of health professionals in exercise prescription for falls prevention. One was developed for delivery in face-to-face mode and the other for online learning. Data were collected on learning outcomes including participation, satisfaction, knowledge acquisition, and change in practice, and combined with costs, savings, and benefits, to enable a break-even analysis from the perspective of the provider, cost-effectiveness analysis from the perspective of the health service, and cost-benefit analysis from the perspective of the participant.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Face-to-face and Web-based delivery modalities produced comparable outcomes for participation, satisfaction, knowledge acquisition, and change in practice. Break-even analysis identified the Web-based educational approach to be robustly superior to face-to-face education, requiring a lower number of enrollments for the program to reach its break-even point. Cost-effectiveness analyses from the perspective of the health service and cost-benefit analysis from the perspective of the participant favored face-to-face education, although the outcomes were contingent on the sensitivity analysis applied (eg, the fee structure used).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The Web-based educational approach was clearly more efficient from the perspective of the education provider. In the presence of relatively equivocal results for comparisons from other stakeholder perspectives, it is likely that providers would prefer to deliver education via a Web-based medium.
  
  
  BACKGROUND
  Australian New Zealand Clinical Trials Registry (ACTRN): 12610000135011; http://www.anzctr.org.au/trial_view.aspx?id=335135 (Archived by WebCite at http://www.webcitation.org/668POww4L).
authors.affiliation: Monash University, Melbourne, Australia. stephen.maloney@monash.edu
authors.forename: Stephen
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Maloney
authors.forename: Romi
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Haas
authors.forename: Jenny L
authors.initials: JL
authors.lastname: Keating
authors.forename: Elizabeth
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Molloy
authors.forename: Brian
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Jolly
authors.forename: Jane
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Sims
authors.forename: Prue
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Morgan
authors.forename: Terry
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Haines
mesh_terms: D003362:Cost-Benefit Analysis; D004496:Education, Continuing / Q000191:economics*; D005260:Female; D006282:Health Personnel / Q000193:education* / Q000523:psychology; D006801:Humans; D020407:Internet; D008297:Male