How to get the most out of Interprofessional Collaborations

How to get the most out of Interprofessional Collaborations

Dr. Samia Chreim,Telfer School of Management, with team members Ann Langley, HEC Montréal, and Patricia Reay, University of Alberta, will attempt to provide an answer to this question through a $140,850 grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) for their project entitled The Dynamics of Interprofessional Collaboration: Bridging between Macro and Micro Levels of Analysis.

In Canada and abroad, members of a variety of disciplines such as health care, social work, engineering, and education are being called upon to cross professional boundaries and to collaborate with each other. This movement towards interprofessional collaboration (lPC) involves adopting integrative approaches and solutions, and is most evident in the health care field where members of different professional or occupational groups such as physicians, nurses, physiotherapists, social workers share their knowledge and engage in joint decision-making to improve service provision.

With a special emphasis on the health care field, Dr. Chreim’s project seeks to understand the obstacles that stand in the way of such collaboration and to consider how successful interprofessional collaboration (IPC) can be realized. Dr. Chreim’s research will prove to be highly useful to government bodies that are engaged in setting policy, to educational institutions that play a major role in devising interprofessional programs and in socializing health care workers, as well as to professional associations that are engaged in setting professional boundaries and codes of conduct for their members. Additionally, it will also provide significant insights to managers and to professionals themselves on the organizational contexts, leadership dynamics and other factors that foster the successful practice of IPC.