Introduction: In-service continuing education offers a unique opportunity to improve knowledge, skills, attitudes, and practices regarding breastfeeding. It has been shown that an online approach to in-service education is effective at improving practices and attitudes toward breastfeeding among health care professionals (HCPs) in the short term. Aim: To evaluate the long-term effectiveness of an online national program on infant nutrition for HCPs. Materials and Methods: We carried out a follow-up study using data from three time points: T0 (pretraining), T1 (immediately post-training), and T2 (1 year after training). The differences between T0, T1, and T2 were tested using repeated-measures ANOVA. Statistical analysis was performed using SPSS version 22.0. Results: The final sample was comprised of 4,582 participants, mainly women (87.4%). At T2, we observed a worsening of attitudes and practices (APs) as compared with T1, though those APs almost never reached the low levels observed at T0. The greatest changes over time concerned the use of drugs during breastfeeding (T0: 3.00 ± 1.33 versus T1: 1.74 ± 1.03 versus T2: 2.64 ± 1.35) and dietary restriction (T0: 2.77 ± 1.35 versus T1: 1.76 ± 1.12 versus T2: 2.57 ± 1.35). The differences between the means of APs at T0, T1, and T2 were significant (p < 0.01). Conclusion: This e-learning program was effective in improving APs regarding the protection, promotion, and support of breastfeeding. The improvement, higher immediately after training, decreased over time. E-learning project managers should propose strategies to facilitate the retention of knowledge related to the main training objectives.
Keywords: breastfeeding; e-learning; education; web-based education.