The Evolution of the Interprofessional Team; From I to We

Research Objectives: To investigate the process of an interprofessional team through a rigorous qualitative thematic analysis

Design: This is a qualitative study of one of 36 tables at an interprofessional symposium. 11 students from 8 professions, led by a facilitator engaged with a patient case while their conversation was recorded, then transcribed, and analyzed. These were treatment and discharge planning conversations between students from Nursing, OT, PA, PT, Speech, Mental Health Counseling, Pharmacy and SW programs at an IPE symposium

Setting: The interprofessional symposium has 480 student participants and 36 facilitators from 8 healthcare professions. Each table engages as an interprofessional teams in patient treatment and discharge planning sessions.

Participants: A total of twelve subjects were recorded during the symposium. These students were pre-selected by their program as good representation of their professions. Each participant wore a body mike for recording the interactions, each recording was transcribed individually and the flow of conversation was transcribed as an additional data source for analysis

Interventions: Each table at the symposium engaged in treatment planning for a hospitalized patient with a CVA who had a history of drug abuse during the morning session. After lunch participants were given an update on the patient condition and engaged in discharge planning based as a team.

Main Outcome Measures: The recordings were transcribed and analyzed using the general inductive approach (GIA).

Results: Three main themes were identified.
“From I to we” -The transition from students representing their individual professions to functioning as an interprofessional team
“I think I hear you saying” chronicled the role of the faculty facilitator, allowing everyone a voice, encouraging participation, keeping the team on task.
“Core Competencies for Interprofessional Collaborative Practice,” describes how the students developed the IPEC competencies over the course of the day.

Conclusions: Analyzing the rich content of the interactions provides a window into the team development process. It is vital to design IPE activities that successfully prepare students to function as an interprofessional team.

Author(s) Disclosures: All authors work at the institution sponsoring the IPE Symposium