Remote collaboration for interprofessional dysphagia care plan establishment with allied health students

Abstract

The current educational resource was developed to provide an interprofessional education (IPE) experience consisting of undergraduate and graduate students enrolled in nursing, nutrition, and communication sciences and disorders coursework. As a part of each course, students were required to participate in a remote, synchronous IPE experience to collaborate regarding a case-based patient scenario. As a part of this scenario, students were required to establish a treatment plan and problem-solve collaboratively with regard to each discipline's specific knowledge and role. Objectives of the curricular resource included increasing student self-efficacy ratings in each of the IPEC competencies (values/ethics, roles/responsibilities, interprofessional communication, and teams/teamwork). Instructors assessed the effectiveness of the resource by administering a pre-post survey to students as well as through voluntary interviews to obtain student perspectives of the IPE experience. Student self-efficacy ratings increased significantly for all four IPEC core competencies following the IPE experience. Qualitative data indicate participants perceived an improvement in all four IPEC competencies and reported benefits aligned to the core competencies. Authors present an IPE curricular resource to guide other educators in the development of similar IPE experiences.