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BACKGROUND:

Interprofessional competence can be defined as knowledge and understanding of their own and the other team members' professional roles, comprehension of communication and teamwork and collaboration in taking care of patients.

AIM:

To evaluate whether students perceived that they had achieved interprofessional competence after participating in clinical teamwork training.

METHOD:

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES:

OBJECTIVE:

PubMed URL: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19242853

CONTEXT:

Student-run clinics (SRCs) are widespread, but studies on their educational impact are limited. We surveyed preclinical medical, nursing, and pharmacy students about their experiences in a hepatitis B elective which provided opportunities to they could volunteer at hepatitis B screening and vaccination SRCs. Student responses revealed positive perceptions of the volunteer experience. Benefits included interacting with patients, developing clinical skills, providing service to disadvantaged populations, and collaborating with health professional peers.

Although physicians and nurses play critical roles in providing team-based collaborative care, the literature on current relationships between physicians and nurses in typical health care settings reveals troublesome characteristics that affect the quality of the patient care that they provide. Studies report communication failures, poor coordination, and fragmented care within and across organizations, which then have been associated with medication errors, patient safety issues, and patient deaths.

Simulated learning activities are increasingly being used in health professions and interprofessional education (IPE). Specifically, IPE programs are frequently adopting role-play simulations as a key learning approach. Despite this widespread adoption, there is little empirical evidence exploring the teaching and learning processes embedded within this type of simulation. This exploratory study provides insight into the nature of these processes through the use of qualitative methods.

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:

The Interprofessional Rural Program of British Columbia (IRPBC) was established in 2003 as a pilot program aimed at supporting the recruitment of health and human service professionals to rural communities in British Columbia, Canada. The program was designed to expose students in the health and human service professions to rural communities and to assess whether this exposure increased the likelihood of their return to work in nonurban settings once they completed their studies.