Development of Interprofessional workstreams to support interprofessional learning

Abstract

Collaborative learning is increasingly recogmised as essential in ensuring the delivery of safe and effective healthcare and fundamental to creating the healthcare teams of the future. Central to this, is the early exposure of healthcare students to multiple healthcare professions to begin the process of thinking and practicing in a more interprofessional way. Thus, after reviewing the literature, an interprofessional module was developed and implemented within an undergraduate nursing curriculum in one university in the UK, consisting of ten interprofessional workstreams to support students' exposure to other professions. This paper describes the implementation process, the assessment component, and addresses the evaluation of the process from both the student and teacher perspective . It aims to provide guidance for other educationalists who may wish to implement a similar programme and to encourage further discussion about the possibilities for the development of a model for interprofessional education and practice.