Interprofessional Collaboration in Healthcare

Interprofessional Collaboration

• Interprofessional collaboration is when multiple health workers from different professional backgrounds work together with patients, families, and communities to deliver high-quality care.
• This improves patient care by allowing individuals to understand the unique skill sets of different healthcare professionals.

Interprofessional Education Collaborative (IPEC)

• Four core competency domains: values & ethics for interprofessional practice, roles & responsibilities, interprofessional communication, and teamwork & teamwork.
• Values & ethics include working together with mutual respect and shared values, as well as having a shared acknowledgement of each participating team member's roles and abilities.
• Communication in teams should be responsible and supportive.
• Health professionals should apply relationship-building values and principles of team dynamics.

Communication

• Communication is a transactional process, involving a sender, message, and receiver, with potential noise.
• Both verbal and nonverbal communications are important in healthcare.
• Verbal communication includes language, pace, tone, and delivery.
• Nonverbal communication includes appearance, body position, eye contact, and hand language.

Interprofessional Communication Tools

• Tools include patient handoff, SBAR communication, CUS language, and difficult conversations.
• These tools are crucial for effective communication among healthcare professionals.

Scope and Purpose of Healthcare Workers

• The sole purpose of enacting these scopes is to ensure that nurses in the jurisdiction are following minimum requirements and standards.
• Competency standards identify the minimum expectations for nurses, and those who fall below these standards or pose risks to the public may not practice in the jurisdiction.
• Nurses are licensed by examination and are subject to licensure requirements and standards.

Differentiating Tasks

• Registered nurses can perform various tasks, including ordering IV solutions, administering medications, lab tests, and assisting patients during surgeries and other procedures.
• Physicians and pharmacists have different duties and roles in patient care.

The Nursing Process

• The Standards of Practice are directive in nature, guiding the professional nurse in completing each component of the nursing process.
• Professional performance standards describe how nurses adhere to practices, complete the nursing process, and address related issues and concerns.
• The nursing process involves assessing information, analyzing data, planning care, implementing the plan, and evaluating results.

Standards of Nursing Practice

• Core principles of ethics include justice, beneficence, nonmaleficence, accountability, fidelity, autonomy, and veracity.
• Nurses must adhere to these ethical guidelines in their practice.

Medical Errors

• Medical errors include negligence and adverse events (unintended incidents with consequences)
• Near misses are events that nearly caused an adverse outcome but did not.
• Never events are errors that should never occur; one example is a wrong-site surgery or pressure ulcers.
• Causes like staff shortages or inexperienced team members can contribute to errors.

Swiss Cheese Model

• This model helps explain how these errors can arise from multiple layers of failures. These failures are described as latent errors.
• Latent errors occur when multiple vulnerabilities (e.g., inadequate training, insufficient communication, or staff shortages) combine to create a system-wide "hole" that can cause an error to occur.
• The model visually demonstrates how errors can "pass through" multiple levels of safeguards, ultimately reaching the patient.

Information Technology in Healthcare

• Accurate and complete patient information is crucial for quality healthcare.
• Electronic communication (including digital records) facilitates communication between healthcare professionals, family caregivers, and patients; this is important in emergency and routine care circumstances.
• Improved coordination and efficient sharing of information through technology reduce errors, improve safety, and facilitate faster diagnostics.
• Technology assists in preventing and reducing medical errors.

5 Types of Leadership Style

• Different leadership styles exist in healthcare, including transactional, innovative, charismatic, situational, and transformational styles.

This quiz explores the principles and practices of interprofessional collaboration in healthcare settings. It covers the core competencies outlined by the Interprofessional Education Collaborative, including values, ethics, and communication within teams. Understanding these concepts is crucial for delivering high-quality patient care.