effect of linear versus adaptive electronic continuing medical education regarding dental bleaching on dentists’ knowledge and satisfaction

Background: studies on the efficacy of adaptive e-learning in dentistry are limited. this studyaimed to compare the efficacy of linear and adaptive electronic continuing medical education(cme) courses about dental bleaching.methods: this quasi-experimental study using a post-test control group design evaluated theefficacy of an electronic cme course on dental bleaching offered to 60 dentists who werenon-randomly allocated in two linear and adaptive groups (n = 30). one training session washeld for participants of both the intervention and the control groups. at the end of the course,the learners participated in a post-test and completed a satisfaction questionnaire. spss 23was used to analyze the results. an independent t test was used to assess the effect of type ofintervention on the outcome of education, and pearson’s chi-square test was applied to assessthe effect of the intervention on participants’ satisfaction.results: the mean post-test scores of participants were 6.33 ± 1.47 for the linear group and6.40 ± 2.31 for the adaptive group. the mean satisfaction scores of participants were 4.02 ± 0.53for the linear group and 4.15 ± 0.42 for the adaptive group. according to an independent t-test,the two groups were not significantly different in terms of post-test score (p = 0.7) or level ofsatisfaction (p = 0.2).conclusion: the adaptive approach has considerable advantages and comparable efficacyto the linear method in terms of post-test score and self-reported knowledge and satisfactionof participants. thus, this method of education may be as effective as the linear method forinstruction in dental bleaching. the use of an adaptive approach is therefore recommended ineducational curricula.