Chronic Kidney Disease Nutrition Research in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Report of an Online Training Modality for Clinical Research Staff and Investigators

With restrictions imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic, it was necessary to develop a training modality for researchers in sub-Saharan Africa participating in an NIH funded, diet and chronic kidney disease (CKD) research study. We developed a three-day module for investigators, clinical research coordinators and dieticians for dietary recall training in sub-Saharan Africa. There were thirty-five attendees to this online course administered via Zoom. Four facilitators conducted training in various aspects of the research protocol including conducting a 24h dietary recall and break-out practice sessions and interviews, for the dietary recall. To assess the efficacy of the training, participants performed a pre and post-test prior to and after the training sessions. The pre-test consisted of 35 multiple choice and open-ended questions. Twenty one participants completed the pre-test and 18 participants completed the post-test. For example, we inquired if 24h recall can be performed during the holidays and the correct responses went from 66.7% on the pre-test to 94.4% on the post-test (p<0.0001). We also calculated the mean score on a question that assessed the qualities of an interviewer performing a 24h recall and the score improved from 96.0%(SD=3.6) on the pre-test to 98.1%(SD=8.8) on the post-test, (p<0.001). Figure 1 shows responses on two questions on using the hand to measure specific food types and how many spoons a finger-tip equates to. We demonstrated that an on-line training module may be a feasible option for clinical research training in low-resource countries.