Factors impacting cost measurements in applied health sciences eLearning: A cross-case synthesis

Background Healthcare resourcing must be significantly increased to meet current and future demand for health professionals. eLearning presents an opportunity to optimize training through scaling, thus reducing training costs. The literature often suggests that a key benefit of eLearning is its cost-effectiveness compared with face-to-face instruction, yet few studies have compared design and production costs or investigated the establishment of standards for the budgeting of these costs. Objectives Determining the cost favourability of eLearning requires an understanding of the components and costs required to build an eLearning course. This thesis’s research objectives are to: A) establish standard ingredients for the cost of eLearning course production; and B) determine the factors causing variances in cost budgeting. Methods This thesis performs a cross-case synthesis among three case studies using horizontal budget variance calculation and a qualitative interpretation of variance using total quality management themes. The various implementation-specific aspects of these cases are used to establish common principles in the composition of budgets for eLearning in the applied health sciences. Results Two case studies report significantly negative budget variances caused by issues surrounding the underreporting of personnel costs, inaccurate resource task estimation, lack of contingency planning, challenges in third-party resource management, and the need to update health-related materials that went out of date during course production. A third study reports a positive budget variance because of the cost-efficiency derived from previous implementation, the strong working relationship within the course project team, and the use of iterative project management methods. Conclusions This thesis makes an original contribution to knowledge by establishing a method of identifying costs in the design, development, and deployment of eLearning, and a way to understand the factors that influence those costs, from project inception to completion.Open Acces