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Successful team care requires a shared understanding of roles and expertise. This paper describes the development and preliminary exploration of the psychometric properties of a tool designed to measure contributions to family practice medication-related processes. Our team identified medication-related processes commonly occurring in family practice. We assessed clinical appropriateness using a sensibility questionnaire and pilot-tested with 11 pharmacists, nurses and physicians.

Personnel shortages are evident for a number of disciplines in the health professions, from physicians to nurses. Project CRISTAL (Collaborative Rural Interdisciplinary Service Training and Learning) was designed to immerse students in rural and reservation communities and encourage them to consider practicing in locations that have shortages of health care providers. Students gain an understanding of the importance of working as part of a health care team and address present and future health care workforce shortages.

AIM:

To explore interprofessional attitudes arising from shared learning in mental health.

BACKGROUND:

Inter-professional education in healthcare is a priority area for improving team-working and communication. Many studies have attempted to evaluate its benefits and challenges, although few emanate from the mental health arena. However, producing evidence to link educational input with clinical outcomes is notoriously difficult. This project attempted to produce evidence for changes in interprofessional attitudes and stereotypes.

METHOD(S):

The aim of this study was to test the feasibility and effectiveness of providing narrative training to a mixed group of doctors, nurses, social workers, and child life therapists on a pediatric oncology service for the purpose of promoting empathy, building teams, and preventing burnout. All staff members were invited to attend a weekly narrative training seminar for 6 weeks.

Teenagers and young adults with cancer face significant challenges throughout their cancer journey. Psychosocial issues are considered to be among the most challenging faced by patients, families and healthcare professionals. Staff from Coventry University met with a group of international experts in Bangkok in 2006 to discuss the specific educational needs of various members of the healthcare team who care for this group of patients. Key concepts discussed there became a reality when this online, interprofessional course was accredited and commenced in February 2007.

PubMed URL: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20102268

CONTEXT: Current trends in medical education reflect the changing health care environment. An increasingly large and diverse student population, a move to more distributed models of education, greater community involvement and an emphasis on social accountability, interprofessional education and student-centred approaches to learning necessitate new approaches to faculty development to help faculty members respond effectively to this rapidly changing landscape.

OBJECTIVE:

This article discusses the strategies and challenges of implementing interprofessional education interventions with students from different disciplines. It reviews two models of interprofessional education in academic prelicensure curricula including the extra-curricular and the crossbar models by considering ease of implementation, program reach and sustainability. It also introduces the interprofessional enhancement approach as an additional curriculum development strategy.

RESULTS:

OBJECTIVE:

To create an interprofessional/interdisciplinary education (IPE), pilot course that provided a representative group of students the opportunity to develop a 6 week fall reduction program for a group of elder volunteers who were independently living in the community. The authors describe the processes that occurred for the course and student-led program to be developed.

RESULTS: