Collaborating for Education and Practice:

1. Physician Nurse Pharmacist Social Worker Health Care/Service Provider Practitioner Stage Continuing Interprofessional Education (CiPE) Post-licensure Collaborative Practice in Rural Mental Health Care Probationer Stage Interprofessional Teamwork Skills Workshop Faculty Development Evaluation Collaborative Practice Clinical Learning Experiences Clinical Novice Stage Pre-licensure Interprofessional Education Health/Illness Learning Modules Pre-Clinical Stage Health & Society: Interprofessional Education Learning Blocks Medicine Nursing Pharmacy Social Work Other Collaborating for Education and Practice: An Interprofessional Education Strategy for Newfoundland and Labrador Co-principal Investigators: Vernon R Curran, PhD, Associate Professor and Dennis Sharpe, PhD, Professor, Memorial University of Newfoundland Partners: Counselling Centre, Faculty of Medicine, School of Social Work, Centre for Nursing Studies, Faculty of Education, School of Pharmacy, School of Nursing and Western Regional School of Nursing • PROJECT GOALS AND OBJECTIVES • expand and promote pre- and post-licensure interprofessional education activities in both education and practice settings; • enhance the collaborative patient-centered practice competencies of an increased number of learners and practitioners in the province; • organize and deliver faculty development initiatives to foster positive attitudinal changes, increased understanding of the roles and responsibilities of other health care professionals, and skill acquisition in the areas being taught to students; • conduct a systematic evaluation of the curriculum framework and project activities • BASELINE EVALUATION • All students and faculty from Medicine, Nursing, Pharmacy and Social Work completed a baseline assessment of attitudes towards interprofessional teamwork and education. • Evaluation Instruments: • Attitudes Towards Interprofessional Health Care Teams (adapted from Heinemann, Schmitt, and Farrell (2002)) • Attitudes Towards Interprofessional Education (adapted from Parsell and Bligh (1999)) • Attitudes Towards Interprofessional Learning in the Academic Setting (adapted from Gardner et al. (2002)) – faculty only • Findings: • Overall positive attitudes towards interprofessional health care teams, interprofessional education andinterprofessional learning in the academic setting. • Variables affecting attitudes includedgender, health professional discipline and prior experience with interprofessional education. KEY TERMS Interprofessional Education: Occasions when two or more professions learn with, from and about each other to improve collaboration and the quality of care (Centre for the Advancement of Interprofessional Education, (UK) rev. 2002). Interprofessional Health Care Teams: Teams consisting of health professionals from at least three different disciplines or professions who share a common purpose and work together collaboratively and interdependently to serve a specific patient/client population and achieve the team’s and organization’s goals and objectives. • INTERPROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES • Health & Society: IPE Learning Blocks: • Delivered to the pre-clinical/practice learner who has limited clinical exposure. • Examples include: Health Promotion through Community Assessment, Professionalism, and Cultural Awareness. • IPE Health Learning Modules: • Delivered during the clinical/practice novice developmental stage to introduce students to interprofessional care planning across settings and patients. • Topics include: Health and Well Being of Children, Rehabilitative Care, Geriatric Care, Palliative Care, HIV/AIDS Care, Mental Health Care, and Newborn Care. • Evaluation Instruments for Blocks and Modules: • Satisfaction with Interprofessional Activity Scale (developed by the CCHPE); Perception of Interprofessional Small Group Session (adapted from Jaques (2000)); Opinions of Interprofessional Teamwork (adapted from Clark (1994)). • Rural Mental Health Interprofessional Training Program: • An interprofessional training program with post-licensure practitioners/professionals in rural areas of the province (including physicians, nurse practitioners, occupational and physiotherapists, clergy, psychologists, law enforcement officers, etc). • The purpose of this program is to increase the capacity of rural health care providers to respond to the mental health needs of people within their own community and to foster the development of collaborative mental health practice attitudes and skills. • Pre- and Post- Training Rural Mental Health Evaluation instruments: • Attitudes towards Interprofessional Mental Health Care (adapted from Heinemann, Schmitt, and Farrell (2002)) • Perception of Interprofessional Collaboration (adapted from Clark (1994)) • Satisfaction with Interprofessional Training Program Scale (developed by the CCHPE) – post-training evaluation only • CHALLENGES • Curriculum Implementation: • Scheduling interprofessional education activities across different curricula and time tables. • Delivering interprofessional education at distributed sites across the province (St. John’s and Corner Brook). • Liaising and promoting interprofessional education across education and health systems. • Evaluation: • Deciding on appropriate evaluation methods and instruments for each project component. • Deciding on the amount of data to collect. • Finding ways to maximize survey response rates. INTERPROFESSIONAL EDUCATION CURRICULUM FRAMEWORK • Findings: • During the 2006 Winter semester, students participated in three interprofessional modules including Health and Well Being of Children, HIV/AIDS Care, and Geriatric Care. • The majority of students agreed that: • The learning experience enhanced their understanding of interprofessional teamwork. • They learned a great deal about the role of their profession on an interprofessional team. • They would recommend the module they participated in to other learners. • Overall, their participation in the module was a meaningful learning experience. • IMPLICATIONS • Blended-learning appears to be an effective way for facilitating interprofessional education for distributed sites. • Faculty development is a key factor in success. • Using/adapting existing measurement instruments. • Minimizing the length and number of surveys and other data gathering approaches. • Minimizing the use of mail-out and web-based surveys. • STUDY LEARNINGS • Promoting and fostering interprofessional education in practice settings is key. • Preceptor/clinical team development is key. • Use of common measures for each project component to enable analysis of different groups and change over time. • Differences in initial results based on demographic variables and health professional affiliation. Project Sponsor: This project is made possible through the financial contribution from Health Canada through the Health Care Strategies, Policy Contribution Program.