Towards good dementia care: awareness and uptake of an online dementia pathways tool for rural and regional primary health practitioners

OBJECTIVE: To explore the awareness and usage of an online Dementia Pathways tool (DPT; including decision tree and region-specific dementia services) for primary health practitioners (general practitioners (GPs) and nurses) in regional Victoria.
DESIGN: Quantitative pilot study using surveys and Google Analytics. SETTING: A large regional area (48 000 square kilometres, population 220 000) in Victoria.
PARTICIPANTS: Two hundred and sixty-three GPs and 160 practice nurses were invited to participate, with 42 respondents (GPs, n = 21; practice nurses, n = 21).
MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Primary care practitioners' awareness and usage of the DPT website usage.
RESULTS: Survey respondents that had used the tool (n = 14) reported accessing information about diagnosis, management and referral. Practitioners reported improvements in knowledge, skills and confidence about core dementia topics. There were 9683 page views between August 2013 and February 2015 (monthly average: 509 page views). The average time spent on page was 2.03 min, with many visitors (68%) spending more than 4 min at the site. This research demonstrates that the tool has been well received by practitioners and has been consistently used since its launch. Health practitioners' valued the content and the availability of local resources.
CONCLUSION: Primary health practitioners reported that the DPT provided access to region-specific referral and management resources for all stages of dementia. Such tools have broad transferability in other health areas with further research needed to determine their contribution to learning in the practice setting and over time.