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OBJECTIVE:

To assess whether structured team briefings improve operating room communication. Design, Setting, and

PARTICIPANTS:

This 13-month prospective study used a preintervention/postintervention design. All staff and trainees in the division of general surgery at a Canadian academic tertiary care hospital were invited to participate. Participants included 11 general surgeons, 24 surgical trainees, 41 operating room nurses, 28 anesthesiologists, and 24 anesthesia trainees.

INTERVENTION:

BACKGROUND:

In response to current trends in healthcare education, teachers at the Michener Institute for Applied Health Sciences implemented a New Curriculum Model (NCM) in 2006, building a curriculum to better transition students from didactic to clinical education. Through the implementation of interprofessional education and simulated clinical scenarios, educators created a setting to develop, contextualize and apply students' skills before entry to the clinical environment.

AIMS:

Medical and nursing students organized a contextual interprofessional learning experience involving observation of surgical safety practices according to the parameters of the World Health Organization (WHO) surgical safety checklist. Students were oriented to patient safety principles, operating room (OR) protocol, and the WHO surgical safety checklist. One hundred thirty students participated in interprofessional OR visitations.

OBJECTIVE:

To design, implement, and evaluate an interprofessional learning workshop on pediatric prescribing.

DESIGN:

An interactive workshop on pediatric prescribing was designed and delivered by pediatricians and pharmacists to fourth-year medical and pharmacy students on 3 university campus settings. Students were assigned to either interprofessional workshop groups (pharmacy and medical students) or non-interprofessional workshop groups (medical students only).

ASSESSMENT:

OBJECTIVES:

To develop and evaluate a classroom-based curriculum designed to promote interprofessional competencies by having undergraduate students from various health professions work together on system-based problems using quality improvement (QI) methods and tools to improve patient-centered care.

DESIGN:

Interprofessional education (IPE) in clinical practice is believed to improve outcomes in health care delivery. Integrating teaching and learning objectives through cross discipline student interaction in basic sciences has the potential to initiate interprofessional collaboration at the early stages of health care education. Student attitudes and effectiveness of IPE in the context of a combined gross anatomy course for first-year students in Doctor of Physical Therapy (DPT) and Doctor of Medicine (MD) degrees curricula were evaluated.

BACKGROUND:

Safe drug prescribing and administration are essential elements within undergraduate healthcare curricula, but medication errors, especially in paediatric practice, continue to compromise patient safety. In this area of clinical care, collective responsibility, team working and communication between health professionals have been identified as key elements in safe clinical practice. To date, there is limited research evidence as to how best to deliver teaching and learning of these competencies to practitioners of the future.

METHODS:

BACKGROUND:

One of the major barriers to effective team working among healthcare professionals is a lack of knowledge of each other's roles. The importance of understanding Irish healthcare students' attitudes towards team working and each other's roles led to the development of this study.

AIMS:

The aims were to investigate allied health professional students' perceptions and experiences of the stroke rehabilitation team and the role of the Speech and Language Therapist (SLT).

METHODS & PROCEDURES:

Interprofessional collaboration is vital to the delivery of quality care in long-term care settings; however, caregivers in long-term care face barriers to participating in training programs to improve collaborative practices. Consequently, eLearning can be used to create an environment that combines convenient, individual learning with collaborative experiential learning. Findings of this study revealed that learners enjoyed the flexibility of the Working Together learning resource.

A significant number of patients requiring critical care are now being managed outside of critical care facilities. There is evidence that staff looking after these patients lack the necessary knowledge and skills to care for them safely, and that effective pre-registration education can play a significant role in addressing these shortfalls in nurses' knowledge and skills.