Tamas Fülöp Award - The network - Towards Unity For Health

POSITION PAPER
The Network: TUFH Executive Committee decided to undertake the writing of a series of ‘Position Papers’ on issues that are
closely related to the aims and objectives of our organisation. They must be seen as starting points for further discussion.
You may contribute by submitting a letter to secretariat@network.unimaas.nl, by participating in sessions on these issues at
Network: TUFH Conferences, or responding to the electronic versions of these Position Papers at the Network: TUFH’s website
(www.the-networktufh.org/publications_resources/positionpapers.asp).
Interprofessional
Education and Practice
The taskforce Interprofessional Education
drive has been repeated by other legislative
provement in service design and provision,
(IPE) changed its title from multiprofessional
and policy requirements in several different
through improvements in interprofessional
to interprofessional in order to emphasize
countries.
learning and improved integration of services
the importance of structured learning with,
and care provision.
from and about different professions, by
The link between multiprofessional and in-
comparison with simply sharing a learning
terprofessional learning experiences and
The increased involvement of service users
environment.
enhanced collaborative ability within a mul-
and carers in the design and implementa-
The term ‘multiprofessional’ is used in the
tiprofessional team or between agencies has
tion of education programmes for health
paper to denote a team, training ward or
student group which contains representation
from a number of professions.
Mission of IPE Taskforce
To enhance the quality of interprofessional
education, learning and practice by drawing
together experience(s) from the international
context.
Learning Together to Work Together
The necessity for collaboration between
health and social care professions and health
and welfare/social care agencies arises from
the multiple needs of specific groups of service
users, the variety of required service responses
to these and the need for effective
information exchange and discussion with
regards to care planning and delivery. The
lack of operation of functional links between
agencies has led to a failure of service and
increased risk to service users. The inability of
multiprofessional teams to communicate has
yet to be fully evidenced, but examples have
been identified which indicate a change in
practice which is sustainable following structured
interprofessional learning experience
within a multiprofessional student population
e.g. (Dickinson & Carpenter, 2005).
Evaluation of studies which focus on such
interprofessional learning experience have
been gathered by Freeth et al. (2002), Barr et
al. (2005) and Hammick et al. (2007). Much
of the interprofessional education discussed
within these studies is carried out within the
workplace and is not accredited by a college
or university. The benefit of explicit relevance
to practice can also be gained through placement
experience within a multiprofessional
team and also through a joint placement
experience within a programme leading to
professional registration.
The Service User
While the IPE taskforce has a specific focus,
professionals is a feature of interprofessional
education in the UK and has been addressed
in the recent UK Department of Health project
Creating an Interprofessional Workforce.
Implementation of Interprofessional
Education / Community and Work-Based
Education
A variety of learning and teaching approaches
are relevant here, amongst them
problem-based learning, collaborative enquiry,
and continuous quality improvements
(Barr, 2003) and also case-based learning
(Lindquist et al., 2005). “Practice-based
learning is seen as essential and can take
many forms; observational study, shadowing,
cross professional placements and experience
on training wards” (Barr, 2003). The timing
of interprofessional education continues to
be a topic of discussion as is the issue of the
importance of embedding or not embedding
uniprofessional identity before engaging
with interprofessional learning.
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also led to a failure to respond to the needs
there are substantial overlaps of interest with
of service users effectively (Conway & Mac-
other taskforces focused on particular groups
The international context in which the IPE
millan, 2003).
of service users e.g Care of the Elderly, and
taskforce functions recognises a number of
Women’s Health. In addition, the delivery
different models of community and work-
The importance of multiprofessional (now
of integrated service is an issue for the IPE
based education, ranging from a joint place-
seen as interprofessional) learning and educa-
taskforce and for specific areas of health
ment between, for example, social work
tion for health professionals was emphasized
e.g. Public Health, and Primary Care. For
and community nursing students as part of
in 1988 by the World Health Organization
this reason this taskforce is interested in col-
pre-registration education to a uniprofes-
(WHO, 1988) in their statement Learning
laboration with other areas of The Network:
sional community-based experience within a
Together to Work Together for Health and this
TUFH in order to encourage and enable im-
medical education programme. There is an op-
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