Working Together to Create COVID-friendly Interprofessional Clinical Teaching Environments That Are Successful in Global Pandemics and Beyond

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, clinical teaching sites at the University of Kansas Medical Center (KUMC) were temporarily suspended, including interprofessional (IP) clinical practice sites. IP education was disproportionately impacted by the pandemic due to its collaborative nature and need for group interaction. To resume in-person teaching at IP clinic sites, KUMC required an approved re-opening plan that assured the safety of students, patients and faculty. This session provides educators with guidance on how to return students to clinical practice teaching sites when space is limited and physical distancing is required.

The presenters will share an IP clinical site re-opening document based on local, state and federal guidelines. We will discuss a successful example with our Geriatric Interprofessional Assessment Clinic (GIAC), and how we incorporated the interprofessional domains into the teaching and re-opening guidelines. Many of the strategies used for meeting safety guidelines in the pandemic can be maintained to allow broader participation of faculty and learners from remote sites. We hope to inspire educators globally that interprofessional clinical teaching sites can be resumed, despite COVID and post-COVID challenges.
Session Objectives:
1. Share lessons learned when balancing a teaching practice site and student/provider/patient safety during and after a global pandemic;
2. Review interprofessional competencies relevant to restarting a teaching practice site safely;
3. Share a model of success at the six-profession GIAC.

Participants will use the model implemented at KUMC as a basis to build a plan to take back to their own institutions. Understanding how to shift teaching styles to accommodate safety whilst optimizing learning is paramount and opens future opportunities. How we handle these pivotal moments, show learners how IP teams can succeed in adversity, and how our learners perform during and after these challenges, will be a marker of our success.