Cross-Professional Competence: Playing well with other team members

Our interdisciplinary team is putting together materials and exercises to teach health science students Cross-Professional Competence (CPC): concepts of communicating between members of the health care team, awareness of roles of the various team members, and the dangers of role blurring. The goal is to make these future professionals aware of the roles and responsibilities of the other members: nursing, PT, dieticians, OT, radiology, PA's, speech/language, TR, social work, medicine, etc. and how they all (should) work together.

How well do you communicate with professionals across your health care team? Do you have memories of training in this area that was effective? Horror stories of things that went terribly wrong in this arena? Articles or training videos on CPC that you'd recommend?
I check my chemo with our PharmD all the time. It's a great resource to have on hand!

Hi Alan,Sounds like a great project. You could have each student research a role (ie nurse, PA, MD etc) and have them present not only their role,but what a typical day for someone in that role would be. Have them interviewsomeone who is currently working in that area. Next, have them come togetherin their assigned role to spend an exercise working together in a role play.Here is where you can add in conflict resolution exercises so they can see thateven an effective team encounters speed bumps.Next, have them dissect the role play, how could the team work togethermore smoothly and effectively.That said, in business school we had numerous opportunities to playout roles and dissect the process. Its great you are giving the studentsthis opportunity.Tufts Medical school implemented a program years ago for medical studentsto follow a nurse for a time period to see what sort of a day a nurse encountered. It was an opportunity to see from a different perspectivehow another team member contributed to patient care and to understandthe nurses role.

Thanks for the great feedback. Our team has gotten hold of a set of instructional handouts and DVDs (not cheap!) from the University of Toronto. (The Canadians seem to be leading on a host of cross-/inter- studies/initiatives.) From the half-dozen components I've been able to view so far, there are simulated conversations between about 8 male and female students, including a nursing student, a social work student, a family medicine resident, and a pharmacy student. Each segment is 3-8 minutes long and provides topics and examples of good and bad behavior to discuss. Our exploration continues. I'll be checking back with everyone as we progress.

Quote from alan headbloom Our exploration continues. I'll be checking back with everyone as we progress.