To address super-aging, the government of Japan launched the Community-based Integrated Care System, which is expected to promote corporate contribution to society1). However, without examples, practical measures for such contribution have yet to be determined2). In such a situation, we are engaged in human resource development through collaboration with a gas company with 1.1 million clients in West Japan. The company aims to educate their employees in charge of gas meter reading in communities (community-based gas meter readers) to care for/support elderly community residents. As the first step, we developed an educational program to improve community-based gas meter readers’ communication skills.
[Objective]
To evaluate the developed educational program for community-based gas meter readers’ communication skills; as communication skills have been reported to be associated with ego states3), we used the Egogram Test for the evaluation.
[Methods]
The program was used for community-based gas meter readers who belonged to a selected office of the gas company between January and October 2017 (intervention group). It consisted of: lectures and practices on communication, adopting a participatory approach, aging simulations, preventive measures against dementia and solitary death, emergency care workshops, and experience-based learning in a salon for elderly community residents.
Before and after intervention, assessment using the Egogram Test was conducted. This test was created by J. M. Dusay as a personality analysis technique based on psychotherapy using transactional analysis (TA) developed by Erick Bern4). We used a new Japanese version of this test, the Tokyo University Egogram Test New Ver. II (TEG II)5).
For statistical analysis, Student’s t-test and the paired t-test were conducted. Furthermore, a two-way factorial analysis of variance with influencing factors as covariances was performed before and after intervention. SPSS ver.24.0 was used for these processes, with the significance level set at 5%. As ethical considerations, the study was previously approved by the Ethics Committee of Fukuoka University Faculty of Medicine.
[Results]
A total of 112 community-based gas meter readers (20 intervention and 92 non-intervention; mean age: 52.8±xx ), who provided valid data, were involved. Comparing the mean score before intervention, there were no significant differences between the groups in any of the 5 domains of the Egogram Test: critical parent (CP), nurturing parent (NP), adult (A), free child (FC), and adapted child (AC). After intervention, the intervention group’s A-score increased from 8.8 to 10.3, while that of the non-intervention group remained at 10.5. The two-way factorial analysis of variance did not reveal significant differences in the main effect on the A-score between the 2 groups, but interactions were observed (p<0.05), confirming improvements in the intervention group in this domain. There were no differences in the domains of CP, NP, FC, or AC.
[Conclusion]
After participating in the program to improve communication skills, the intervention group’ s A-score increased in the Egogram Test, supporting its effectiveness to develop logical and objective thoughts and learn as a result of changes in attitudes toward communication. Based on this, creative business activities to help elderly community residents to lead a safe life may be performable even for employees of non-care service providers. Company employees were suggested to become important human resources for overcoming further advanced aging in the future in Japan. As a secondary outcome, participation in the communication seminar also improved participants’ work environments.