The University of Leicester, De Montfort University and University of Northampton are celebrating a major milestone in innovative interprofessional training for health and social care students, which will lead to improved healthcare for patients.
Cases of fatalities in our hospitals, fortunately extremely rare, receive major headlines in the national press. Some of these cases may be attributed to a breakdown in communication or lack of understanding between the different healthcare professionals involved.
However, the incorporation of interprofessional education into the training of students in all areas of health and social care will mean a better understanding of the roles each of them play in caring for patients, better communications between them, greater awareness of patient needs and less room for error.
Through the project more than 10,000 health and social care students have been brought together during their professional training over the past five years, to prepare to work in teams.
The three universities have worked together to design joined up learning for trainee nurses, doctors, pharmacists, social workers, speech and language therapists, and other related professionals, ensuring that newly qualified health and social care professionals understand how to work effectively together, sharing information and skills.
Dr Elizabeth Anderson, Project Leader, who is Senior Lecturer in Shared Learning and a National Teaching Fellow in the University of Leicester, commented: "The vast majority of the general public access health and social care services infrequently. However, these encounters normally involve meeting more than one person. Medical teams can consist of receptionists, doctors, nurses, therapists and social workers, either in the community or in hospital.
"With the expansion of knowledge we have seen an expansion in new team members, often making effective team-working difficult. All too often vital information fails to be shared, possibly influencing our care and causing, for example, delays in referrals."
The Interprofessional Education programme developed by Leicester, De Montfort and Northampton Universities has helped to improve the knowledge and communication between health and social care professionals and emphasise the need for acquiring the right skills and attitude for care centred on clients and service-users.
This is expected to improve, not just lack of understanding between health care workers, but also lack of collaboration and lack of recognition between the professions of what contribution each healthcare professional can make to patient care.
Developing this new learning across ten programmes started in 2005, setting targets for 2010. It has been complex to organise and resource-intensive but today the three universities celebrate reaching their first strategic milestone.
This now means that in some local hospitals, as well as university classrooms, students learn together in preparation for future practice.
In many hospital wards students are already working together in small teams and clients might be asked to support their learning.
Many patients have come forward to help with the development of these programmes, accepting home visits by health and social care students. Others have shared their stories to help minimise poor practice. In some teaching units patients have run teaching sessions with academics.
Now the universities plan to develop more interprofessional learning with health and social care organisations, and clients may just find themselves surrounded by a trainee interprofessional student team next time they visit their local NHS.
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