Interpersonal collaboration is the integration of multiple healthcare workers drawn from diverse professional backgrounds in a bid to work cohesively with families, patients, caregivers, communities and all stakes to deliver the best and highest levels of healthcare. It is an integral practice in the sector, and nursing practitioners and healthcare facilities use it to ensure proper patient transitions, among other vital services.
Successful transitions of patient care essentially require robust collaboration amongst healthcare stakeholders and providers. Healthcare facilities and organizations, for example, can employ a plethora of strategies to promote inter-professional collaboration precisely during patient transitions. My facility, in particular, ensures inter-professional collaboration through upholding leadership support, spearheading multidisciplinary integration, and also through early identifying of at-risk patients. It also enhances transitional planning, medication management, ensures easy transfer of information, and also encourages patient and family engagement or action.
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In order to provide the most efficient healthcare as well as improve the overall patient outcomes, nurses have an obligation to effectively collaborate with healthcare team members from other cardinal disciplines. As such, nurses must candidly understand each member’s education, precise areas of expertise, scope of practice, among others. Additionally, learning the norms, language and other special foci of various other respective disciplines also fosters efficient and more effective employment of knowledge and appropriate resources. Nurses should thus embrace the professional responsibilities and roles of other team members, build relationships to efficiently plan, evaluate and implement safe care, as well as communicate effectively with families, patients and professionals in healthcare (Jakubowski & Perron, 2018) .
Despite ambitious efforts to enhance inter-professional collaboration, there however exist various setbacks and gaps that adversely hinder its efficient application. As such, lack of interdisciplinary collaboration is still a significant challenge facing healthcare executives, practicing nurses and health professionals in general. The most notable gap is the historic gender gap particularly between nursing and medicine. According to Bankston and Glazer (2013), medicine is a prevalently male-dominated career. Thus, this plays a huge role in hindering the ability of nurses and physicians to collaborate effectively. Another gap is the deeply entrenched subordinate and superior relationships between nursing and medicine. Also, educational programs for nursing and medicine remain segregated, and this is another notable gap in inter-professional collaboration in the healthcare sector.
References
Bankston, K., Glazer, G., (November 4, 2013) "Legislative: Interprofessional Collaboration: What’s Taking So Long?" OJIN: The Online Journal of Issues in Nursing Vol. 19 No. 1.
Jakubowski, T., & Perron, T. (2018). Interprofessional collaboration improves healthcare. Reflections on Nursing Leadership Journals .
