Improving Interprofessional Communication During Virtual Team Conferences with Patient/Caregiver: Video-Based Simulation Learning

Interprofessional education has been focused on student education and competency development to foster effective patient-centered communication between health professionals. However, explicitly including the patient’s and caregiver’s voice as members of the IPE team should be a core component of further IPE learning and competency development. Evidence demonstrates a correlation between effective health professional-patient communication and improved patient health outcomes (Riedl & Schüßler, 2017), suggesting that optimal care can be provided by including the patient, and caregiver (when involved/with patient consent) as part of an IPE team. SBAR (Situation, Background, Assessment, Recommendation), a common communication tool for critical information sharing between professions, can be effective in advancing IPE communication in non-virtual and virtual team meetings (Velji et al., 2008), and may be effective at assisting students in understanding the importance of the patient voice in the IPE team (Trentham et al., 2010). Consistent with Innovations in Interprofessional Learning theme, we have developed video-based simulation learning exercises which demonstrate both effective and ineffective communication within an IPE team. These videos innovatively include the patient and caregiver voice, which can help students better understand the value and importance of the patient and caregiver as a member of the treatment team, especially with regard to improving patient outcomes. These videos also address the above components in a telehealth model, demonstrating how effective IPE communication can still be achieved in virtual settings. Professionals from a variety of health care settings are represented in the videos (nursing, occupational therapy, physical therapy, social work, respiratory therapy, speech language pathology), and uniquely demonstrate how these professions work together to learn about, from and with each other to improve patient care. These learning videos can have vast utility in IPE modules to assist students in interprofessional communication and understanding the importance of the patient voice in the IPE team.