The Pharmacy Student: What Are the Perspectives on Inter-Professional Learning?

The Pharmacy Student

Inter-Professional Learning: Healthcare has always been one of the vital fields in every society. After all, it is the quality of healthcare services that ensures the overall wellbeing and quality of life for people.

Due to the utmost importance, this field is being regularly developed to provide better, more advanced services to people. The methods of health education also undergo significant transformation. The main goal of change is to prepare more conscious and up-to-date specialists.

One of the commonly used practices in medical education is called inter-professional learning. This approach continues to garner attention. What are the core concepts behind it, and what are the perspectives of such education? 

What Is Inter-Professional Learning?

If you want to learn more and sort this out, let’s dig deeper and get to know what inter-professional learning really is and what benefits it offers!

What is the core concept behind inter-professional education?

It is a close collaboration between representatives of two or more professions. The term itself refers to a unique, innovative method of learning and teaching. 

The technique implies that learners from multiple health fields should study together through all stages of their professional training.

The term is also referred to as IPE. This form of education strives to cultivate collaborative learning and practice. It is used among pharmacy and health students. Sharing the classroom, students from various fields get a chance to learn from and about each other. 

The key goal of sticking to such an approach is to prepare real experts. Another objective is to deliver more patient-centered healthcare services.

This method is widely applied in educational facilities. It is also used in the workplace where pharmacy and healthcare students acquire practical and applicable experiences.

Today the inter-professional education is gaining momentum. Despite this fact, there is still a debate on the effectiveness of this method. 

The Pros and Perspectives of Inter-Professional Education

According to the FIP Education report, the IPE is centered on creativity and innovation. The report also calls it a mainstream education activity. This is due to an increase in global cases of its adoption.

Inter-professional learning can offer a variety of benefits. Some of the main pros include better insight into different roles and stimulated teamwork. 

In a nutshell, there is the following main goal – to improve the overall health care delivery. Here are some of the pros and perspectives of IPE

Increased Effectiveness of Health Care

The most significant perspective of IPE is a boost in the quality and effectiveness of the healthcare industry. This form of education focuses on patient-centered practice. It teaches future specialists to put patients and their needs at the center of professional practice.

Such an approach to healthcare does have the potential to improve the overall quality of services.

Diversified Perceptions

One of the students who participated in the IPE program marks it as a positive experience. A learner notes that as a pharmacy student or specialist, you would typically not pay any attention to experts who work in other fields. Participation in the IPE program, on the contrary, opens eyes to what is going on around.

Patient care is a diversified field. It includes dozens of specialists from various backgrounds. Inter-professional education helps students understand this point more clearly. 

It allows one to gain a better understanding of others’ roles in this cycle. Also, this learning method actually enables young specialists to develop a positive attitude and perception of other specialists.

Collaboration

Another pharmacy student explains that collaboration was an essential part of the IPE experience. He says that the pharmacists’ communities are typically a bit isolated from other professionals. But, when you start working, you realize that teamwork in hospitals is a lot more than many believe.

The inter-professional approach stimulates collaboration at the early stage of education. It helps young specialists learn how to communicate with each other and cooperate on a more regular basis.

Interactivity

The IPE often involves a variety of interactive activities. This has several key benefits:

• Efficiency. According to a study conducted by Carnegie Mellon University, interactive activities are six times more effective than regular learning;
• Higher engagement. Students are generally more engaged in the learning process when it is more interactive and collaborative;
• Motivation. Both interactivity and close collaboration, which form the basis of IPE, can boost students’ motivation. It helps them perform at the top of their abilities.

The Bottom Line

There may not be enough evidence to confirm the positive influence IPE has on the overall quality of medicine and patient care. Still, this learning technique has already proven to have some benefits.

What is the biggest issue regarding patient care? Specialists believe it is a lack of collaboration and communication. The absence of these components leads to lower patient outcomes and more errors. 

From this point of view, inter-professional education offers an undoubted benefit. It stimulates a positive attitude and perception as well as helps young experts recognize the roles and contributions others make into healthcare.

Is it really that good? Many pharmacy and other students mark their IPE experiences as effective and positive ones. Does this mean that this form of learning has pretty good perspectives? Without any doubt! 

After all, a tight collaboration of specialists is likely to bring several benefits to patients.