Abstract
BackgroundCommunication is an indispensable skill in the everyday working life of a veterinary team. In German higher educational institutions, communication skills training is explicitly mentioned in the curricula of veterinary assistants, including veterinary nurses and veterinary technicians, and of animal keepers, but not for undergraduate veterinary medicine. Little is known about interprofessional education in veterinary medicine and related professions. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to describe and explore the current interprofessional state of knowledge regarding communication skills of the aforementioned groups in Germany.MethodsTo explore the perception, assess the knowledge and identify the attitude regarding communication skills and interprofessional training, an online survey was distributed. The survey was sent to all five veterinary higher educational institutions, 38 schools for veterinary assistants and 15 schools for animal keepers throughout Germany.ResultsIn total, 294 veterinary students, 111 veterinary assistant trainees and 62 animal keeper trainees participated. The majority of participants (98.07%, n = 458) perceived communication skills as highly important for their everyday work. In total, 413 participants (88.44%) felt that their communication skills needed improvement and more than half admitted having difficulties in effective communication (59.31%; n = 277). In addition, 62.74% of respondents (n = 293) were not sufficiently informed about the training content of their future colleagues. Most were convinced that training could positively influence on their communication with clients (95.72%; n = 447) and the team (92.29%; n = 431), and 76.45% of respondents (n = 357) wished to participate in an interprofessional training.ConclusionsResults of this study confirm that communication skills are perceived as highly important for professional life. Students and trainees show a great interest in communication skills and interprofessional training. The findings indicate that appropriate adjustments to existing curricula are necessary in Germany.
Highlights
Communication is an indispensable skill in the everyday working life of a veterinary team
Due to the high relevance of communication skills in the veterinary field when working with clients and members of the team, the focus in this paper is on interprofessional communication
The veterinary team may include various professions, this study focuses only on veterinary students, veterinary assistant trainees and animal keeper trainees
Summary
Communication is an indispensable skill in the everyday working life of a veterinary team. Communication varies due to different contexts and contents and represents a core competence of a veterinarian besides medical knowledge and medical examination skills [3]. An increasing demand for veterinary specialists can be observed and veterinary teams collaborating in cooperate veterinary group practices or veterinary clinics are growing in size [5] This collaboration is defined as interprofessional collaborative practice [6] and includes, alongside other skills, interprofessional communication as a core competence [7]. Animal keepers can be employed in a veterinary practice, where they are responsible for the animal care and assisting with procedures and treatments [9] Similar to veterinarians, both professions come in close contact with clients in their everyday professional life
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