MedEdPORTAL (Jun 2014)
Interprofessional Care: An Introductory Session on the Roles of Health Professionals
Abstract
Abstract Introduction It is widely accepted that when health care providers work interprofessionally, clinical outcomes improve. In addition, most accreditation standards in health professional education include a requirement for implementation of interprofessional education. In order to train our health professional students to act interprofessionally and realize the importance/value of teamwork in the healthcare setting, this session was designed to provide pharmacy, medical, and physician assistant students with an opportunity to interact with each other, learn about one another's roles in health care, practice team-building skills, and reflect upon their experience in the session. This is a 2-hour case-based session to train health professional students to be aware of the roles of other health professionals. Methods The session was originally conducted with pharmacy, physician assistant, and medical students but is can easily be used for the education of other health professions. Materials provided include a faculty development session with training guide, presentation, and video, as well as student and faculty guides for the student session. Results This submission was fully implemented and is being revised for future years, and is being expanded upon to include PT, OT, and dentistry. Our postsession questionnaire showed that 92%, 81%, and 83% of medical, pharmacy, and PA students, respectively increased their knowledge about the scope of practice of another health profession. Also, notably, pharmacy and med student learned the most about PA students. Overall, session evaluations were positive. Discussion The session primarily utilizes group discussion punctuated by small group activities to create inter-professional understanding involving students form physician assistant, pharmacy, and medicine programs.
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