Inter-professional Collaboration Makes a Difference in Patient Outcomes
Cochrane’s inter-professional collaboration
There are various forms of inter-professional collaboration in healthcare. The daily inter-
professional team collaboration in healthcare has been proved to demonstrate less of an impact
for the community whereas it has significant positive effects for the acutely ill patients who are
admitted in the hospitals. The monthly collaborations are more effective for the management of
psychotic patients through medication prescription.
Video conferencing are more effective for
the management of the patients as compared to the audio one where the patients are not in visual
contact with the medical teams (Zwarenstein et al.,2009). Patients who attended care through
conferencing demonstrated shorter stay in the hospital and the duration of treatment was brief as
well. The effect of multidisciplinary management is greatly achieved with the help of external
facilitators (Zwarenstein et al.,2009). Many of the patients under the program demonstrated
improvement and any other results were due to them being healthier and stable thus the effects
were not very significant.
Inter-professional collaboration and improved patient outcomes
The increased demand for healthcare services and the rise in the number of patients living
with multiple co morbid chronic medical conditions has continued to increase over the past years
in the US which has necessitated the collaboration and effective communication between various
medical departments. The life expectancy for the US people is currently at 78.5yrs and most of
them are living with chronic conditions such as cancer and stroke (Bressler & Persico 2016).
Through the healthcare reforms there is an improvement in the multifaceted levels of care with
much emphasis on proper collaboration among all disciplines. Due to the increased rate and
INTERPROFESSIONAL COLLABORATION3
prevalence of multiple conditions among the US populations the best management approach is
the multidisciplinary collaboration and team work to ensure improved patient outcomes.
The main objective of healthcare management is improvement of patient outcomes.
Through collaboration of various health teams, personnel of different skills and experiences are
brought together with a common goal of ensuring patient recovery (Bosch & Mansell 2015). To
ensure quality care the nurses have collaborated with all medical professionals during service
delivery which has led to improvement of medical services due to supporting one another. When
team members come together they are able to enhance care delivery through diverse expertise
and even the quality and cost of care is achieved. Medical collaboration enables the care givers
to share their opinions and ideas on the patient treatment and diagnosis which is very helpful and
it has also helped reduce the number of hospital readmissions.
One of the improvements of health team collaborations is the reduction in the errors
caused in care provision. They are a common burden that has been currently affecting the health
department in US (Zineldin et al.,2014). Inter-professional collaboration is the key in the
reduction of mortalities due to various improvements such as reduction in the number of
preventable illnesses, decreased morbidity, and enhanced drug adherence. Medical errors (ME)
are a leading cause of death and injuries in all healthcare facilities even for the highly skilled and
experienced (Bosch & Mansel 2015). They are hard to avoid as human is to error and thus they
have demonstrated more effects even than Aids and cancer. According to the US Institute of
Medicine (IOM), approximately 44,000-98,000 people died due to ME in the year 2000
(Zineldin et al.,2014). One of the leading causes of MEs in the facilities is poor communication
and teamwork which has been reflected in areas such as medical administration thus causing
severe adverse effects.
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Teamwork and patient care outcomes
Effective teamwork in healthcare has been demonstrated to have positive effects on the
quality and patient outcomes. Proper teamwork results to enhanced cooperation and
communication among care givers which is significantly reflected on the services given.
Improper communication has led to an increase in twice the number of deaths that could have
been prevented during patient care (Rosen et al.,2018). Through quality teamwork in service
provision the patient have generated more satisfaction thus improved mutual trust, clarity, and
two way communication in the hospitals. Comprehensive and thorough care is only achieved
when the members come together as a team to manage the patients. An international meta-
analysis of inter-professional collaboration studies have shown favorable results in teamwork,
decreased clinical errors, and improve patient education (Bressler & Persico 2016).
Conclusion
Inter-professional collaboration in healthcare is the current development in the system
that has helped reduce the cases of mortality related to chronic conditions in the US. With proper
teamwork, the quality of care is achieved and the patient outcomes improved. It involves
bringing together the people from different departments with the aim of establishing coordinated
care. Thus, based on the recommendation by the World Health Organization (WHO), it is
necessary for the health care providers (learners or staff) to be committed to the principles of
inter-professional collaborative practice to develop efficient collaboration, provide patient
centered care, and improve health care outcomes (Moradi et al.,2016).
INTERPROFESSIONAL COLLABORATION5
References
Bosch, B., & Mansell, H. (2015). Interprofessional collaboration in health care: lessons to be
learned from competitive sports. Canadian Pharmacists Journal, 148(4), 176-
179. Retrieved from: https://doi.org/10.1177/1715163515588106
Bressler, T., & Persico, L. (2016). Interprofessional education: partnerships in the educational
proc. Nurse Education in Practice, 16(1), 144-147. doi: 10.1016/j.nepr.2015.07.004
Moradi, K., Najarkolai, A. R., &Keshmiri, F. (2016). Interprofessional teamwork education:
moving toward the patient-centered approach. The Journal of Continuing Education in
Nursing, 47(10), 449-460. doi: 10.3928/00220124-20160920-06
Rosen, M. A., DiazGranados, D., Dietz, A. S., Benishek, L. E., Thompson, D., Pronovost, P. J.,
& Weaver, S. J. (2018). Teamwork in healthcare: Key discoveries enabling safer, high-
quality care. American Psychologist, 73(4), 433-450. DOI:10.1037/amp0000298
Zineldin, M., Zineldin, J., &Vasicheva, V. (2014). Approaches for reducing medical errors and
increasing patient safety: TRM, quality and 5 qs method. TQM Journal, 26(1), 63-74.
DOI:10.1108/TQM-03-2012-0029
Zwarenstein, M., Goldman, J., & Reeves, S. (2009). Interprofessional collaboration: effects of
practice‐based interventions on professional practice and healthcare outcomes. Cochrane
database of systematic reviews, (3).
