Navigating Interprofessional Working in Healthcare

The interpersonal working in healthcare is referred to the involvement of two or more healthcare professional who works together to accomplish common objectives and goals at work as well as are related with resolving various problems and complex hindrances regarding care services (WHO, 2013). The aim of this reflective account will be looking at a clinical experience the author has been involved in and looking at how interprofessional working (IPW) was maintained. In the process, the Jasper (2013) and Shaw (2011) reflective approach is to be utilised to highlight IPW and how it was significant to the author experience.

In clinical practice, the author was working as a student nurse in an elderly ward where the person was allocated to take care of patients with complex needs for which the individual required assistance from a range of healthcare professionals. This is to ensure the needs of the service users are effectively met and quality care is established. The benefit of interprofessional working is that diverse knowledge, talents and skills from different healthcare personals can be shared among one another to develop a collaborative approach to achieve the common care goals for the service user (O’Carroll et al. 2016). In the practice, the author by understanding the benefit of interprofessional working established effective communication with various other professionals while developing changes in caring for the patients as well as during the development of care plan for the service users. The author tried to interact with different professionals to understand the impact of care for the patients and made sure the duplication of care is avoided as well as trust between professionals is established. The author by working in interprofessional working environment learned ways in which biological and social needs of the patient is to be managed. The author mentioned that all the professionals including the person expressed proper knowledge regarding the limitation in care services each have to follow ensure collaborative working in established.

The learning regarding the way duplication of care is to be avoided in interprofessional working within healthcare is required as it leads to deliver unnecessary repeated care to service users. This creates hindrance for them to receive actual care as well as makes healthcare professionals waste their skills and energy in delivery same care that is not at all required by the service user (Nguyen et al. 2019). Thus, the understanding and awareness of avoiding duplicated care by the author was an effective approach of interprofessional working as it helped the person to avoid wastage of skills and energy in providing unnecessary care to same patients thus avoid reducing the care efficiency. As mentioned by Foronda et al. (2016), communication establishment is one of the key skill required to establish effective interprofessional working. This is because through interaction between various professionals the individual to finally offer care to the service users understand the care activities specific for the patient to be provided and assistance from health professionals to be implemented to ensure quality care delivery. In the clinical environment, it was seen that the author was able to successfully establish communication with different professionals which was an effective approach towards establishment of interprofessional working.

The presence of mutual trust and respect among professionals while working through interprofessional approach is required to avoid conflict and hindrance in delivering care (Anderson and Kinnair, 2016). This is because lack of trust would lead other professionals to avoid working collaboratively as they would think their instruction regarding care for the patient would not be followed properly making them feel less valued to show involvement in care delivery. Moreover, the lack of trust and respect leads to raise conflict among the professionals in interprofessional working making unable to work collaboratively to deliver successful care (Souza et al. 2016). In the practice, it was seen that the authors focussed on to ensure trust and respect between health professionals are maintained ensuring effective approach towards establishment of interprofessional care was established by the person.

Additionally, nurses are bound to the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) (2018) code of conduct. The NMC ensure that all students should have the opportunity to be provided with interprofessional education within the practice (NMC, 2018). From the author being able to have this opportunity, has enhanced their practise for when they are qualified and develop the quality of care, they provide to the patients in their daily care duties (Day, 2013). As well as highlighting the different areas patients may need referring to, to promote their recovery and get them back to their baseline before admission or as close to (Tang et al., 2018). Even though in the team, other professionals were bound to other regulatory bodies General Medical Council (2019) and Health and Care Professions Council (2018) the team highlighted their competency in IPW. They showed excellent teamworking skills and making sure all care gaps were reduced by utilising each area with the skilled professional and working as one to provide the best outcomes for each patient (Barrett et al., 2005). Similarly, being placed in a coaching ward saw the traditional way of learning of one mentor being changed to working with several qualified nurses and see how they all utilise their IPW skills and learning from their techniques (Day, 2013). By being placed with a wide range of professionals and seeing their different learning styles and adapting to all clinical activity saw the author maximising their potential for IPW in focusing on specific goals, reflecting, planning and delivering the care that was necessary (Homeyer et al., 2018).

Reflecting back, the author has the knowledge of why it is essential to maintain IPW throughout working. From this,they will be taking forward how effective communication and having great teamwork can enhance patient care from all professionals working promptly and bring each of their skills to the team. The author will be upholding their regulatory body code of conduct (NMC, 2018) and maintaining the standards while working with other professionals to improve the service users by imputing their views they hold on each individual and contributing them to the team in the correct manner. From observing a variety of nurses skilled IPW I will be utilising their approaches in practice to make sure patient personal centre care is maintained and actively listening and respecting all views made from the diversity of the team. The author feels confident that they are able to promote IPW and educate other students that they come in contact with of the importance IPW has on effective patient care delivery. Finally, also promoting personal centre care to maximise patient recovery.

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References:

Anderson, E.S. and Kinnair, D., (2016). Integrating the assessment of interprofessional education into the health care curriculum. Journal of Taibah University Medical Sciences, 11(6), pp.552-558.

Barrett, G., Sellman, D., Thomas, J. (2005) Interprofessional working in health and social care: professional perspectives. New York; Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

Day, J. (2013) Interprofessional Working: An Essential Guide for Health and Social Care Professionals. 2ndedn. Andover: Cengage Learning

Foronda, C., MacWilliams, B. and McArthur, E., (2016). Interprofessional communication in healthcare: An integrative review. Nurse education in practice, 19, pp.36-40.

Homeyer, S., Hoffmann, W., Hingst, P., Oppermann, R, F., Dreier-Wolfgramm, A. (2018) Effects of interprofessional education for medical and nursing students: enablers, barriers and expectations for optimising future interprofessional collaboration – a qualitative study. BMC Nursing: 17(1).pp. 10–15.

Nguyen, J., Smith, L., Hunter, J. and Harnett, J.E., (2019). Conventional and Complementary Medicine Health Care Practitioners’ Perspectives on Interprofessional Communication: A Qualitative Rapid Review. Medicina, 55(10), p.650.

Nursing and Midwifery Council. (2018) Future nurse: Standards of proficiency for registered nurses. London: Nursing and Midwifery Council.

O’Carroll, V., McSwiggan, L. and Campbell, M., (2016). Health and social care professionals’ attitudes to interprofessional working and interprofessional education: A literature review. Journal of Interprofessional Care, 30(1), pp.42-49.

Souza, G.C.D., Peduzzi, M., Silva, J.A.M.D. and Carvalho, B.G., (2016). Teamwork in nursing: restricted to nursing professionals or an interprofessional collaboration?. Revista da Escola de Enfermagem da USP, 50(4), pp.642-649.

World Health Organisation. (2013) Interprofessional Collaborative Practice in Primary Health Care: Nursing and Midwifery Perspectives Human Resources for Health Observer. [Online] Available at: https://www.who.int/hrh/resources/observer13/en/. [Accessed on 6th October 2019].