Geriatric oncology is based on the synergy between several professionals whose common goal is to improve care for older patients with cancer. This requires sharing a common core of knowledge to facilitate collaboration between them. To date, training in geriatric oncology has been limited in scope and difficult to access for caregivers, particularly nurses and healthcare aides. To meet this need, a massive open online course (MOOC), in geriatric oncology has been developed in France. This kind of course aims to provide simultaneous access for a large number of participants and to foster communication with the pedagogical team through discussion forums. The first session of the MOOC, which has been set up in the Occitania region of France, went online nationwide from March 6 to June 23, 2020. Despite the SARS CoV-2 global health crisis, 1020 people subscribed to the first session and 417 (40.9%) were certified at the end of the course. Most are nurses (35.2%) and work outside Occitania (56.3%). A survey revealed a high satisfaction level regarding relevance of lessons (97.9%), pedagogical quality of teaching team (97.9%), knowledge acquisition (93.6%), meeting learners' needs (90.4%) and practical value of the course (88.3%). This preliminary experience demonstrates the ability of this MOOC to spread the culture of geriatric oncology and the educational potential of this new type of online training.
Spreading geriatric oncology culture through professional caregivers: Results of a French massive open online course (MOOC)