ADVANCING HEALTH THROUGH NURSING PROGRESS OF THE CAMPAIGN FOR ACTION Interprofessional Collaboration and Education

The Institute of Medicine (IOM) report, The Future of Nursing: Leading Change, Advancing Health, identifies interprofessional collaboration among health care providers as an essential part of improving the accessibility, quality, and value of health care in the United States. The report highlights four key messages, one of which emphasizes nurses’ role as “full partners, with physicians and other health professionals, in redesigning health care.” Another underscores that nurses “must be accountable for their own contributions to delivering high-quality care while working collaboratively with leaders from other health professions.” This message emphasizes the importance of nurse leadership in advancing interprofessional collaboration in all settings, including in the boardrooms of organizations that have an impact on health and health care delivery. The same year that the IOM report was published, the World Health Organization (WHO) released a blueprint for implementing interprofessional education and collaborative practice to meet demand in the face of a global health care workforce shortage. In the WHO framework, collaborative practice “happens when multiple health workers from different professional backgrounds work together with patients, families, carers and communities to deliver the highest quality of care.” It makes sense that the best care would be delivered by a team of “carers” or providers with diverse experience, education, and training—all of whom exchange information with one another and are dedicated to patient health and well-being. Interprofessional collaboration is based on the premise that when providers and patients communicate and consider each other’s unique perspective, they can better address the multiple factors that influence the health of individuals, families, and communities. No one provider can do all of this alone. However, shifting the culture of health care away from the “silo” system, in which clinicians operate independently of one another, and toward collaboration has been attempted before without enduring success. For nearly five decades a commitment to interprofessional learning has waxed and waned in health professions training programs. During this time, health care leaders have shown intermittent interest in interprofessional collaboration in the delivery of health care. Strong and convincing outcome data demonstrating the value of team-based care have been lacking, but changes in our health care system now require that we explore how we can make interprofessional collaboration the norm instead of the exception. The Future of Nursing: Campaign for Action is a collaboration of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) and AARP that was established in late 2010 to implement the IOM’s recommendations at the national and state levels. To date, 51 action coalitions and dozens of national organizations are committed to carrying out this important work. In this article, we highlight the imperative to shift professional cultures toward collaboration, current state initiatives designed to foster interprofessional collaboration, opportunities and resources for incorporating interdisciplinary efforts into daily practice, and the challenges that remain. By Mary Sullivan, PhD, RN, FAAN, Richard D. Kiovsky, MD, FAAFP, Diana J. Mason, PhD, RN, FAAN, Cordelia D. Hill, LMSW, and Carissa Dukes, BGS