Challenges and benefits of interprofessional education: Evaluation of the inter-professional initiative at the University of Southern California

Teacher Education Quarterly, Fall 1999 by McCroskey, Jacquelyn, Robertson, Peter J

There is growing awareness that many of our most difficult and complex urban problems cannot be adequately addressed by large-scale traditional institutions, especially those that work in isolation from each other and from the communities that they are trying to serve. The "common purpose" of many reformers working to rethink these institutions is to develop seamless webs of services and supports that can help to improve outcomes for children, youth, families, and communities (Schorr, 1998). This will clearly require collaboration on many levels-between groups of community residents (Medoff & Sklar, 1994), between community members and professionals (Bishop, Taylor & Arango, 1997; Cutler, 1997), and between different kinds of professionals.

While such collaborative efforts are not new, having existed since at least the turn of the century (Addams, 1961), interest in collaboration has waxed and waned. Interest peaked in the 1960s and 1970s, when the federal government sponsored numerous efforts to improve services for the poor and disadvantaged, and decreased again during the Reagan years of the 1980s. In the 1990s, collaboration, partnerships, and integrated services are once again being seen as effective approaches to resolving complex urban problems (Waldfogel, 1997). According to a report from the United States General Accounting Office (1995), integrative approaches are more viable now than ever, since community organizations have gained experience and there is some infrastructure to provide funding and technical assistance.

Communities throughout the United States have developed collaboratives to help professionals deliver a comprehensive continuum of services to clients in need (Chang, De La Rosa Salazar & Leong, 1991; Himmelman, 1992: Melaville & Blank, 1991, 1993; Morrill, Reisner, Marks & Chimerine, 1991). These collaborative efforts include individuals and organizations representing a broad range of professions. Successful collaboration requires effective interaction among these professionals and the people they hope to help. Yet many professionals, due in part to the nature of their professional education, do not have the knowledge, skills, and/ or attitudes needed to operate effectively in an interprofessional environment. Thus, increasing attention is being given to the importance of developing effective interprofessional education programs.

Interprofessional Education

The knowledge base gained from years of experience with interdisciplinary education provides the groundwork for interprofessional education programs, which are distinguished by their added focus on preparing students for application of their skills and knowledge in professional service delivery organizations. Interprofessional education can help prepare workers for practice in fast-paced challenging community-based environments by preparing them with "a more comprehensive set of diagnostic and treatment capabilities, by shared working knowledge of applicable ethical considerations, and by an understanding of patient/ clients as whole beings and as carriers of cultural complexity and social change" (Snyder, 1987: 98).

A primary purpose is to overcome the limitations inherent in most professional education programs, namely, the relatively limited set of perspectives, values, and norms that are instilled to guide the professional's practice. Interprofessional education is intended to broaden the student's exposure to other professions, both to develop a better understanding of multiple roles and to learn how to collaborate to improve service delivery. Whereas most professionals are taught to specialize and focus on the few areas where they are most knowledgeable, interprofessional practice encourages the professional to focus on the human being as a whole person within his/her family, community, and societal systems. The key is integration of mind, body, and spirit (Dunn & Janata, 1987).

Students need to learn to appreciate the skills, knowledge, and expertise held by members of each discipline so that they will respect and value input in the team's decision-making process; learn the functional roles of each discipline in the team; learn the interpersonal skills necessary for practice in a multidisciplinary context; and learn the skills required for problem-solving and decision-making in groups (Bassoff & Ludwig, 1979). They also need to learn skills associated with group dynamics, conflict resolution, problem solving, decision-making, interpersonal relations, and interpersonal, group and organizational communication (Klein, 1990).

A key unanswered question concerns the personal characteristics of students who will be most successful in interprofessional education programs. Although there has been very little empirical research designed to examine the premise that certain individuals are more likely to succeed in collaborative initiatives, some programs have tried to outline the unique characteristics of students likely to be successful in interdisciplinary education. Klein (1990: 182-183) identifies these characteristics as