Open AccessHealthcare Teams: Terminology, Confusion, and Ramifications
Author(s) -
Aleysha K Martin,
Theresa Green,
Alexandra McCarthy,
Przemyslaw Marcin Sowa,
E-Liisa Laakso
Publication year - 2022
Publication title -
journal of multidisciplinary healthcare
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.65
H-Index - 30
ISSN - 1178-2390
DOI - 10.2147/jmdh.s342197
Subject(s) - confusion , terminology , health care , computer science , data science , psychology , political science , linguistics , philosophy , psychoanalysis , law
One strategy to meet increasing consumer demand for healthcare services in the pandemic era has been to reorganize the healthcare workforce. This can be achieved by reorganizing healthcare teams, which are associated with improved workforce productivity and better patient outcomes. However, healthcare teams are described using numerous terminologies and labels, which has led to conceptual confusion for researchers and research users. In this paper, we explore the disparate nature of healthcare team terminology, ramifications of conceptual confusion, and we propose standardized terminology with synthesized definitions focused on characteristics of clinically based healthcare teams including unidisciplinary, multidisciplinary, interprofessional, and transdisciplinary teams.