The primary objective of this SBIR project is to assess the scope and quality of teaching materials on cardiovascular nutrition designed for physicians and medical students; and to develop innovative instructional materials that fill the gaps in existing materials. In Phase I the lack of adequately validated and well designed instructional materials utilizing advanced educational media was demonstrated. The specific objective of Phase II is to develop and evaluate the effectiveness of interactive video as a teaching medium for cardiovascular nutrition. The effectiveness of the CAI module as a teaching tool will be determined among fourth year medical students on internal medicine rotations enrolled at four medical institutions. The commerical product will be a 2-sided Level III videodisc and the interactive computer program in 5 1/4 inch floppy disk. The program will be designed to run on an IBM/XT/AT compatible computer. The development of this program will provide training for physicians in accurately assessing cardiovascular risk and advising their patients to make appropriate dietary changes and will reinforce the dietitians' role in promoting dietary modification as a means of reducing disease risk.
