Policy planners, educators and practitioners in the health care community have long discussed the importance of increasing cooperation, collaboration and teamwork among health care professionals. As far back as the 1980’s, the World Health Organization advocated for ‘multi-professional’ education among undergraduate health care students to build “the skills necessary for solving the priority health problems of individuals and communities that are known to be particularly amenable to team-work. The emphasis is on learning how to interact with one another” ². More recent research is demonstrating the improved patient care outcomes arising from an increase in health care teamwork ³.

Much has been accomplished in the past two decades around the world to create, foster, support and evaluate interprofessional educational programs for pre-licensure health care students and licensed practitioners. These programs aim to build the knowledge, skills and attitudes which underlie collaborative practice and teamwork ⁴. In Canada, the federal government has actively promoted and supported research and education programs across the country through its Interprofessional Education for Collaborative Patient-Centred Practice (IECPCP) Strategy ⁵, and more recently, in supporting the Canadian Interprofessional Health Collaborative (CIHC), the pan-Canadian network of interprofessional activity ⁶.

Within the Faculty of Community Services and Health Sciences at George Brown College, we are creating innovative and interactive opportunities to bring together students and faculty from different health care professions in order to share their perspectives while learning together in areas of common interest. Our goal is to enable George Brown graduates to be job-ready as successful collaborators and team-players in health-care practice with the ultimate goal of improving patient outcomes. We have established four foundational interprofessional learning outcomes which will enable them to be well-rounded and better collaborators and health care team members upon graduation. These involve developing: (i) a broader understanding and appreciation of the relationship between one’s own profession and the background, scope and roles of other healthcare professionals, (ii) team skills, (iii) collaborative skills as a member of a patient-centred health care team, and (iv) a broad appreciation for the organization and ethical issues of the health care system in which they will work.

To meet these interprofessional learning outcomes, we are developing an exciting array of interprofessional education opportunities for students of all programs ⁷. These IPE experiences range on a continuum from collaborative interactive learning with students of other professions in the classroom to applied collaborative practice with students of other professions in simulated and actual clinical situations. The latter includes our on-campus outpatient clinic, our simulated practice centre, and partnering with health care providers in the community such as hospitals, clinics and long term care facilities, to provide real-world interprofessional clinical field placements.

The following are some examples of the range of IPE experiences that we are providing to students at George Brown College

The Interprofessional Learning Clinic ⁸

At George Brown's Interprofessional Learning Clinic, the general public and members of the College community are offered a number of health and wellness services. All services are provided by student clinicians under the direct supervision of George Brown's expert health sciences faculty, all of whom are registered professionals. These services include: dental health, hearing, fitness and lifestyle and community health promotion.

The Health Promotion Hub (Community Learning Centre for Healthy Living) ⁹ provides students with a unique interprofessional applied learning experience in the practice of health promotion. Initiated in September 2007, the health promotion service supports the community clinical / field placement requirements from several programs, including nursing, dental hygiene, fitness & lifestyle management, hearing instrument specialist, health information management and social service worker. In addition we have partnered with the Fitzgerald Academy at St. Michael’s Hospital to enable second year medical students from University of Toronto to join our interprofessional student health promotion teams. This supervised field experience enables and supports student collaboration and interprofessional student learning, applied practice and scholarly research related to community-based health promotion.

Learning To Care Together ¹⁰

Learning To Care Together (LTCT) , involves a unique collaboration between George Brown College and Revera Inc., operator of long term care and retirement living residences across North America. Together, we are creating an innovative interprofessional education partnership including interprofessional field placements for our students at Revera’s long term care residences. This experience enables interprofessional interaction between George Brown students and Revera’s staff care-givers, and exposes learners to positive examples of collaboration and resident-centred practice in long term care. As well, we are creating new interprofessional curriculum to be used both at the college and for professional development at Revera, in key areas related to the care of seniors.

This project has received provincial funding over three years through the Interprofessional Health Education Innovation Fund , co-sponsored by the Ontario Ministry of Health and Long Term Care and the Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities.

GSSC 1053: Collaboration - The Future of Health Care

GSSC 1053 is our first formal interprofessional education course. Initially offered in Fall 2007, this 14-week, 42-hour course provides students from several programs with a broad understanding of how collaboration and teamwork are key to Canada’s health care system in the new millennium. Students learn about the theories of team work and collaboration and put this into practice through a project which emphasizes these attributes.

references

1. UK Centre for Advancement of Interprofessional Education (CAIPE); Retrieved fron http://www.caipe.org.uk/about-us/defining-ipe/
2. Learning Together to Work Together for Health. Report of a WHO Study Group on Multi-professional Education of Health Personnel: the Team Approach. Technical Report Series #769. World Health Organization, 1988
3. Sorbero, M.E., Farley, D.O., Mattke, S. & Lovejoy, S. (2008) Outcome measures for Effective Teamwork in Inpatient Care. Final Report for the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. Rand Health, Santa Monica.
4. Barr, H. (2001). Interprofessional Education: Today, yesterday and tomorrow. A review commissioned by the Learning and Teaching Support Network for Health Sciences & Practice from the UK Centre for the Advancement of Interprofessional Education.
5. Health Canada: Interprofessional Education for Collaborative Patient-Centred Practice; retrieved from http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/hcs-sss/hhr-rhs/strateg/interprof/index-eng.php
6. Canadian Interprofessional Health Collaborative; retrieved from http://www.cihc.ca ;
7. George Brown College Interprofessional Education; retrieved from http://www.georgebrown.ca/healthsciences/ipe.aspx
8. George Brown College Interprofessional Learning Clinic; retrieved from http://www.georgebrown.ca/clinic/index.aspx
9. George Brown College Community Learning Centre for Healthy Living - An Interprofessional Applied Practice in Health Promotion; retrieved from http://www.georgebrown.ca/healthsciences/health-promotion/index.aspx
10. Learning To Care Together project; retrieved from http://www.georgebrown.ca/healthsciences/interprofessional-education/IPE-Learning-to-Care-Together.aspx