Objective: Patient provider encounters for chronic multisympom illness (CMI) and/or environmental exposures are difficult often resulting in Veterans and providers having high levels of dissatisfaction. Patients attribute these difficulties to providers lacking knowledge about these health concerns. It is not known whether providers perceive themselves as lacking expertise in CMI and environmental exposure concerns.
Methods: This needs assessment used a descriptive online survey design. A total of 3632 VA healthcare providers across disciplines were surveyed.
Results: Healthcare providers reported speaking with Veterans about CMI and environmental exposures despite feeling they have minimal to no knowledge of these topics. At the same time, only half of the providers had taken an available training on CMI or environmental exposure within the last year.
Conclusion: Healthcare providers recognize a knowledge gap regarding CMI and environmental exposures, despite this, there is low uptake of provider education on these topics.
Practice implications: A better understanding of barriers to uptake of training on CMI and environmental exposures is needed to increase engagement with these important trainings.
Keywords: Exposures; Functional somatic disorder; Functional somatic syndrome; Gulf war illness; Medical education; Medically unexplained symptoms; Needs assessment; Online survey; Persistent physical symptoms; Physician training; Provider training; Toxic exposure; Veterans.
Copyright © 2021. Published by Elsevier Inc.