Healthcare is a dynamic field which keeps evolving based on new knowledge acquired from research. One of those pertinent healthcare issues whose uptake has been on the rise is interprofessional collaboration (IPC). IPC is a process where different healthcare professionals work as a team and involve the community, patients, caregivers, and family in the provision of high-quality care (Kersbergen et al., 2020). The main reason behind this is that the coordination allows each person to view healthcare from each other’s point of view, thus delivering high-quality patient-centered care. Traditionally healthcare workers used to work in groups consisting of specific health professionals as more emphasis was put on solo acts. However, in recent times people are advocating for healthcare workers to work in teams comprised of different healthcare professionals. This paper will describe the impact of interprofessional collaboration on my organization, give a summary of two articles on IPC, and explain how IPC is addressed in other healthcare organizations. It will also describe strategies that can be used to manage the organizational impacts of IPC and the effects of the strategies.
Impact of IPC on My Healthcare Organization
The healthcare organization I work for is gradually embracing interprofessional collaboration, and its impact has been enormous. For instance, the coordination of patient care has significantly improved. During rounds, different healthcare professionals are present, like a physician, nurse, and pharmacist. Since the pharmacist started attending rounds, the cases of adverse drug reactions have significantly reduced in the healthcare organization. Moreover, interprofessional collaboration has reduced the rate of staff turnover. Initially, it was reported that people left the organization due to frustration caused by lack of proper coordination, but since the IPC program was implemented, different healthcare professionals seem to be more happy and satisfied with their job.
Furthermore, medical errors have significantly reduced due to the increased collaboration and improved communication as a result of IPC. Like in any other healthcare organization, impaired communication is linked to an increased probability of a medical error. The quality of care provided to patients attending our organization has also significantly improved. This is because of various factors. For instance, IPC has made it easy to refer patients from other healthcare facilities to our facility. This is because it ensures all the necessary patient information is transferred together with the patient. Thus, it reduces the risks that usually occur to patients during transfer. Improved communication also ensures that every aspect of the patient is comprehensively taken care of due to the efficient flow of information between different healthcare professionals (Bosch & Mansell, 2015).
When a healthcare team is formed around a patient, it allows maximum attention to be provided to the patient and improves the quality of care provided to the patient (Reeves et al., 2017). IPC has also placed different professionals in my organization at the same level. Hence, we can work as a unit and push for the agenda to improve patient care and working conditions of healthcare workers as a unit.
Articles Summaries
I am going to briefly explain the review of the two articles on interprofessional collaboration.
Article 1: The article is titled “Interprofessional collaboration in health care: Lessons to be learned from competitive sports.” It is written by Brennan Bosch and Holly Mansell. The article states that for the delivery of healthcare to be successful, healthcare workers have to coordinate like players of highly successful teams. This means that they have to be
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