Abstract

Background and Aims:
Health care organizations seek a qualified and competent workforce to achieve their goals. Imple¬menting effective training programs will improve or maintain desired outcomes. Training is valuable in fulfilling many goals in healthcare, with patient safety being a central purpose. Ideally, training serves relevant needs, and assessment to fetch such needs is a crucial initial step. Training need assessment (TNA) is a systematic process that utilizes data from different sources to develop and evaluate training activities related to skill and Knowledge, aiming to provide adequate training to target individuals with reasonable costs.

Methods:
This study aims to explore the status of TNA practice applied by trainers in health-related institutions in Saudi Arabia. The cross-sectional study was conducted in the training departments in Health institutions in Saudi Arabia. The sample size was (103 subjects). In addition, the research team developed an online survey as a data collection tool based on a literature review.

Results:
The result shows that most trainers have more than ten years of experience in training, and 52% of them (23 out of 44 expert trainers) apply scientific or professional TNA upon exploring the knowledge of trainers on TNA structure. The majority agrees with “TNA aligns training with” organizational goals (88%), organizational needs (87%), performance gaps (82%), and target population needs (82%).

Conclusions:
Follow-up studies are required with a larger heterogeneous study population and more detailed data acquisition tools. Also, we recommend establishing a healthcare training committee of expert trainers to create a harmonized framework for TNA tools development using the best available evidence and expert consensus. This should serve as a guide for healthcare trainers in Saudi Arabia and a ground for collaborative work with international committees.

Key words: Training need assessment, Gap analysis, trainers