Symposium furthers the cause for interprofessional education and practice
“Changing Practice, Improving Outcomes” was the straight-off-the-headlines theme of VCU’s Third Annual Jewell and Carl Emswiller Interprofessional Symposium.
Today’s rapidly changing health care environment mandates that closer attention be paid to the need for interprofessional education and practice. To that end, about 100 scientists, health care practitioners, academicians and students attended the symposium April 25 at the Richmond Marriott downtown.
Keynote speaker Valentina Brashers of the University of Virginia discussed “Linking Interprofessional Education to Interprofessional Practice.” Brashers is founding co-chair of the U.Va. Center for Academic Strategic Partnerships for Interprofessional Research and Education (ASPIRE).
The big question, Brashers noted, is whether interprofessional education and team training can be linked with effective team-based practice processes and improved patient outcomes. That’s one of the questions U.Va.’s Center for ASPIRE is striving to answer.
When developing interprofessional “interventions,” Brashers said, it is most important to involve and listen to all stakeholders, from health care professionals to patients.
Additional lectures and discussions centered on new approaches to increase interprofessional education and collaboration and how to apply lessons learned from programs that already are in place.
Alan Dow, VCU’s assistant vice president of health sciences for interprofessional education and collaborative care, helmed a workshop on naming behaviors that define interprofessional competency. University of Michigan College of Pharmacy professor Frank Ascione discussed lessons learned from the creation of an interprofessional decision-making course for university students.
Interprofessional education at Eastern Virginia Medical School also was discussed, and Old Dominion University faculty offered tips on leading health care initiatives, change and interprofessional teams.
More specific topics included preparing interprofessional teams to use technology in caring for older adults requiring palliative care, as well as integrating communications and team-based care via multidisciplinary education.
Examples of interprofessional practice in action included the Improving Health for At-Risk Rural Patients project with Carilion New River Valley Medical Center; VCU’s Complex Care Clinic; VCU’s Va-LEND Program; Richmond Health and Wellness Program; and the Family Communication Coordinator Protocol in cases of organ donation.
Anthony Stavola, a vice chairman of Carilion Clinic’s Department of Family and Community Medicine, noted that health care is not undergoing a change, it’s undergoing a transformation. Carilion’s collaborative experience with IHARP, he said, “enabled us to transform the way we treat our patients. … It’s making my job better, and I can’t imagine going back to the way things were before.
“We have seen major improvements across the board in readmissions and in patient and provider satisfaction.”
The big challenge, he said – as is often the case — is to figure out, as the IHARP grant winds down, how to sustain the program and provide additional resources that will allow interprofessional colleagues to continue to work together for the good of the patient.
Victor Yanchick, senior executive director for the Center for Interprofessional Education and Collaborative Care, announced the winners of the symposium poster competition, to which more than 20 posters were submitted.
Dianne F. Simons of VCU School of Allied Health Professions won the people’s choice award for “Refining the Design of the Achieving Healthcare Professionalism.” Poster judges Ascione, Bruce Britton of Eastern Virginia Medical School and Julie Strunk of James Madison University conferred first place upon VCU School of Pharmacy’s Evan Sisson for “Pharmacist-Physician Collaboration to Improve Blood Pressure Control in an Inner City Safety-Net Clinic.”
To see presentation handouts, click here and scroll down to “2015 Symposium Program and Presentations.”
Members of the 2015 symposium planning committee were Melissa Abell, School of Social Work; Sean Bates, Danielle Fife and Leticia Moczygemba, School of Pharmacy; John Boothby, School of Medicine: Melissa Burton, Alan Dow, Kelly Lockeman, Elizabeth Micalizzi and Victor Yanchick, Center for Interprofessional Education and Collaborative Care; Angela Duncan and Diane Dodd-McCue, School of Allied Health Professions; Pamela Flynn and Kim Isringhausen, School of Dentistry; and Jeanne Walter, School of Nursing.
The Emswiller Interprofessional Symposium is endowed by Jewell Emswiller in honor of her late husband Carl and their shared passion for collaborative, patient-centered pharmacy practice. Carl Emswiller, a 1962 alumnus of the MCV School of Pharmacy, was a leader and innovator in community pharmacy practice.
Categories Events, Faculty news, Student news