Interprofessional Education

[atstudent]

All: I am currently working on my Masters in Medical Sciences with a Pediatric Sports Medicine emphasis. This question has come up in one of my classes as the NATA continues to explore this idea. I just wanted to get your thoughts as well...

Do your PT programs integrate classes with other health professions? With athletic training students? With physician assistant students? With nursing students? With medical students? ETC

Is this beneficial? Is it harmful? What are your thoughts?

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[nangus]

My school has a interprofessional seminar course, if you will. It includes all the health profession students at our school (PT, nursing, Public Health, resp therapy, SLP, health admin, etc) Since so much time is required to teach is our respective crafts there isn't time for much more than a couple of discussion topics and a 4 hour Pt interview/team meeting. Nothing exceptional but at least it is something as the health care model continues to change.

 

[DPTinFL]

At Univ. of South Florida, the first yr DPT students take all the core science classes with first yr. MD students. It saves the school money and hopefully can be passed on to students.

 

[shab12]

In Stony Brook University, 1st yr DPT students take Anatomy lecture and lab along with 1st yr OT, Speech therapist and PA students. During lab time every table had students from each programs. I thought it was a nice experience. Sometimes we ended up crossing over affiliation with some of the OTs as well. I though it was helpful esp working with OTs.

 

[DancerFutureDPT]

NUPT doesn't have interdisciplinary coursework, so to speak (other than the MD students being in the anatomy lab at the same time we were on occasion, but they're doing their own thing on the other side of the room). But, during the clinical shadowing during the first year on our "health care fieldtrips", we not only shadowed PTs but everyone shadowed at least one non-PT health provider (I personally shadowed a nurse, a social worker, OT, and a SLP) to learn more about what they do and how they interact with PTs. Some people shadowed MD/DOs, PharmDs, different hospital techs, etc. I thought it was a kinda cool way to get exposed to the other areas in a real-life situation.

 

[Jarrodmac10]

At the University of Puget Sound, during our first semester, we met up with nursing students from another university and taught them basic biomechanics and transfers (sit-stand, slide board, ect). In return, they are instructing us this semester on how to work with patients with catheters and IV tubes.

 

[ACECPT]

At Midwestern University PT's take Anatomy and Physiology courses with PA's, NA's and BioMed Master's students. I think it is beneficial for a couple of different reasons. A) It allows individuals from other states to make new friends outside of those in their program, B) It allows for networking as many PA's will eventually rx PT and having them as a friend may benefit you if you're a private practice PT. All in all I think it's great because all disciplines will eventually work together so we might as well start early

 

[kingsandmen]

All: I am currently working on my Masters in Medical Sciences with a Pediatric Sports Medicine emphasis. This question has come up in one of my classes as the NATA continues to explore this idea. I just wanted to get your thoughts as well...

Do your PT programs integrate classes with other health professions? With athletic training students? With physician assistant students? With nursing students? With medical students? ETC

Is this beneficial? Is it harmful? What are your thoughts?

At UF we take a course as first years called Interdisciplinary Family Health. All 1st year medical, dental, PT, pharmacy and nursing must take this. We're assigned a family in the community (three students from three different disciplines) and assess their wellness level and work on a project to help them. They've also had us take some IHI courses regardng patient safety and medical errors from a healthcare system model and we've talked about some ethical and cultural issues. I can't imagine an argument for intercollaboration being harmful. I think it's beneficial to expose us now just because healthcare systems often utilize a team approach to patient care. Here's a post with more info about the class. http://post.health.ufl.edu/2011/02/04/interprofessional-education/