Minding the gap: Prioritization of care issues among nurse practitioners, family physicians and geriatricians when caring for the elderly

Accumulating health problems of the elderly requires recognition of geriatric syndromes, while shifting away from a conventional disease-specific approach. 

Moore and colleagues recently surveyed 179 practitioners representing Family Physicians (FPs), Nurse Practitioners (NPs) and geriatricians in Ontario, in order to quantify how they prioritize syndromes, diseases and conditions in the elderly. Identifying differences may inform opportunities for interprofessional sharing of expertise among professionals pursuing a common goal, which is expected to improve interprofessional collaboration.

Their survey (response rate 36%) identifies that NP, FP and geriatrician respondents all recognize co-occurrence of “multiple morbidities” as one of the most frequently encountered issues when serving the elderly, however FPs and NPs place higher priority on managing individual chronic diseases than explicitly prioritizing geriatric syndromes. The findings identify a need for a more clearly defined role for the geriatrician as syndrome-educator and implies further need for collaborative approaches to caring for seniors that values different professional’s expertise.

Read More: http://informahealthcare.com/doi/abs/10.3109/13561820.2014.966352

Student reflections following exposure to a case-based interprofessional learning experience: Preliminary findings

Goldberg et al.'s recent study analyzed students’ written reflections following their initial exposure to interprofessional teamwork in case-based problem-solving. A three-hour seminar featuring three sequenced scenarios was developed and offered 12-times over two semesters. A total of 305 students from a variety of healthcare programs worked together with standardized patients in an on-campus laboratory simulating hospital ward and rehabilitation settings.

A thematic analysis of students’ reflections showed that they valued the shared learning and realistic case study. However, they felt the experience would be strengthened by working in smaller, more representative teams that included students from medicine, psychology, and social work to enable more effective communication and comprehensive case discussion. 

While useful for future planning, the identified themes did not enable a comparative statistical analysis of what students found helpful and difficult and a re-coding of students’ responses now is underway. Implications for measuring the effectiveness of future interprofessional case-based learning center on addressing the identified weaknesses, and establishing a research design that enables a comparison of pre- and post-seminar data, and the effectiveness of the IPE experience compared to profession-specific experiences.

Read More: http://informahealthcare.com/doi/abs/10.3109/13561820.2014.969835

Interprofessional mental health training in rural primary care: Findings from a mixed methods study

The benefits of interprofessional care in providing mental health services have been widely recognized, particularly in rural communities where access to health services is limited. There continues to be a need for more continuing interprofessional education in mental health intervention in rural areas. There have been few reports of rural programs in which mental health content has been combined with training in collaborative practice.

This study by Heath and colleagues used a sequential mixed-method and quasi-experimental design to evaluate the impact of an interprofessional, intersectoral education program designed to enhance collaborative mental health capacity in six rural sites.

Quantitative results reveal a significant increase in positive attitudes toward interprofessional mental health care teams and self-reported increases in knowledge and understanding about collaborative mental health care delivery. The analysis of qualitative data collected following completion of the program, reinforced the value of teaching mental health content within the context of collaborative practice and revealed practice changes, including more interprofessional and intersectoral collaboration.

This study suggests that imbedding explicit training in collaborative care in content focused continuing professional education for more complex and chronic health issues may increase the likelihood that professionals will work together to effectively meet client needs.


Read More: http://informahealthcare.com/doi/abs/10.3109/13561820.2014.966808