computer skill levels of staff of vice chancellery of health at kermanshah university of medical sciences

dear editor computer is one of the fundamental tools in applying most electronically-based teaching methods. many studies on the students of university of medical sciences have been focused on their computer and internet skill levels. the skill levels in using computers and internet in isfahan university of medical sciences (iums) were estimated 14.87 and 12 (from 20), respectively (1) and this amount was 12 out of 20 for the managers of the hospitals affiliated with that university (2). 73% of the students of mashhad university of medical sciences had average familiarity with the computer (3) while, 36.4% of the dentist students of this university had sufficient skill in using electronically-based education system (4). the present study aimed to measure skill level of using computer and internet among the staff of vice chancellery of health at kermanshah university of medical sciences. in this study 246 individuals with associate and bachelor degree and physician of kermanshah province, from urban and rural centers were selected using stratified sampling procedure. 88.2% of the participants returned the questionnaire. generally, 43% of the participants had very high skill in using computer, in the following order: the staff of province centers (60%), urban area (56.2%), and rural ones (29.6%). the findings of the present study are in line with those obtained by bahadorani, hosseini and masoudi (1, 2, 4); while these findings are not in agreement with the results obtained by vafaee and alavi (3, 5). there was no statistically significantly association between staff's work experience and skill in using computer and internet. generally, 13.8% of the participants had very high rate of skill in using internet. this amount belonged to individuals with 11 years of experience and above and lack of skill in using computer belonged to individuals with 5 years of experience. the lowest level of skill in using computer (8.3%) and internet (9.3%) belonged to rural centers. the highest level of skill in using computer (66.7%) and internet (50%) belonged to individuals having master degree. the highest level of skill in using internet belonged to individuals having 10 years (or over) experience and the lack of enough skill in using internet belonged to individuals having 6 years of experience. generally, 16% of the participants empl­oyed electronically-based educational methods at high and very high level. this level, of course, was lower than that of vafaee (3). 61.8% of the participants used electronically-based teaching in education in low or medium, and %80 of the individuals who had master degree employed electronically-based education at medium or high level. employing electronically-based education in a very high level belonged to individuals having 7 years (or longer) experience and lack of employing this method belonged to individuals having 9 years experience. there was no statistically significantly association between employing electronically-based education and individuals work experience (p= 0.018). health staff of province and urban centers had high level of skill in using computers and internet in education. therefore, using electronically-based education method is recom­mended for their continuous education.