Academic Detailer Training and Resource Material Template Recommendations

These template recommendations for academic detailer training and resource material is based on our survey of the five academic detailing organizations in Canada, two from the United States and one from Australia.

1. Academic detailing programs should produce a detail document, which will serve multiple purposes. It will provide a distillation of the literature on a given topic into a format that can be used to educate the academic detailing program’s detailers. It will also act as a reference document for the detailers as they proceed with their intervention.
2. Academic detailing programs should produce a “library” of primary references that provide background for its detail document. This library could be in many different forms including a bibliography, a web-based repository or a binder of literature sent out with the toolkits. This library should not include every document used to synthesize the detail document, but should pull key research articles, meta-analysis and review articles that are most important to the intervention. With this package of materials, a self-assessment questionnaire or quiz could be provided. Items like this assist learners in determining if they have successfully understood the information provided.
3. Academic detailing programs should develop a training presentation that has a flexible delivery mechanism. This flexible delivery mechanism could include connecting the presenters to sites through a video-link or training sentinel individuals within the organization to deliver the presentations (similar to the NPS system). The training should provide a synopsis of the key messages out of the detail document as well as the evidence behind these messages. It should also provide an opportunity to showcase any additional documents created for the intervention (ex. newsletters, prescribing aids or patient information materials). This process would allow the two-way interactive dialogue that is a common feature of all academic detailing training programs we evaluated. The slides or presentation notes of the detailer training may also be a resource for detailers as they take their materials to the primary care prescribers. Although most detailing is conducted one-on-one, opportunities for small-group presentations may lend themselves to some form of presentation, where this slide material is quite valuable.
4. It should not be necessary for COMPUS to develop all the ancillary resource materials for detailers. For example, documents like detailing intervention scripts would be the responsibility of the individual organizations to create on an as-needed basis. Development of materials like this are a component some organizations’ (ADS and DATIS) detailer training. COMPUS could provide a mechanism for the sharing of these developed resources to facilitate cooperation and efficiencies between organizations throughout the country.
5. Academic detailing programs should provide a mechanism of follow-up questions or clarifications with detailers. In COMPUS’s situation, as the original authors of the material will no longer be the individual detailing organizations who are readily accessible to their detailing staff, COMPUS will need to provide an opportunity or mechanism to provide ongoing to support to detailers in the “field”.