Can Preparation of Clinical Teachers in IPC Concepts and Competencies Impact Their Approach to Teaching Students in Clinical Practice? A Promising Approach

The challenge of providing interprofessional (IP) student placements within health agencies can be affected by two factors: patterns of health care agency placements focusing on students in one health professional program setting at a time; and budgets for funding clinical teaching in post-secondary institutions. These challenges can result in uni-professional, practice-based learning rather than learning to work within IP teams. Given the increasing focus on IP teamwork (World Health Organization 2010), the question arises as to whether there is a way clinical teachers can be prepared to work with students for IP teamwork. One strategy involves training clinical teachers with requisite strategies for working in team-based settings. Interprofessional clinical teaching workshops held at Western University, Canada, were started in 2010, and offered annually each fall. The overall workshop goal was to assist teachers in guiding and assessing students for effective collaborative teamwork. This article reports on a post-workshop evaluation of participants’ self-reported clinical teaching and practice from three workshops. Of the 129 workshop participants approached to provide information, only 30 completed the post-workshop assessment (at variable times following the workshop from six months to two years). Of these, 27 reported changes in interprofessional communication and role clarification, as well as in their clinical teaching and practice. While there are limitations to the study because of the low follow-up rate, this approach supports the conclusion that providing clinical teachers with interprofessional education (IPE) related to their clinical teaching can result in reported modifications in their clinical teaching and practice.