A Library and Interprofessional Education (IPE) Collaboration: A Discussion on How the Library Can Play an Instrumental Role in Helping to Plan and Support IPE at Health Sciences Institutions
Background: Interprofessional education/collaboration is an area of growing emphasis at both small and large health providers who are seeking to improve the cost and healthcare effectiveness of patient care. At the presenter’s institution, key members of each of the colleges (Nursing, Pharmacy, Dental Medicine) formed a committee to develop a four-day Interprofessional Edcuation summit to explore ways in which each of the health disciplines could work together to improve patient care and collaborate as teams. The presenter volunteered with the planning committee in order to foster librarian/faculty collaborations and offer ways in which the library can help support interprofessional education.
Description: After defining and discussing the learning objectives of the IPE summit with the committee, the presenter identified areas in which the library could effectively support the objectives and fill information gaps. Library staff then worked in collaboration with faculty planning members, to develop new online content related to background research and literature on interprofessional collaboration as well as developed and led one of the primary in-person learning activities of the summit. Through this collaboration the presenter hoped to promote a welcoming environment for future faculty/library partnerships as well as offer library research expertise to the 200+ attendees at the summit. The experience also served as valuable feedback on the information needs of library patrons related to interprofessional collaboration. Towards the conclusion of the summit an evaluation was administered to attendees to gather feedback on the effectiveness of the event.
Conclusion: This presentation will briefly describe the results of the four-day IPE summit held in November 2019, as well as a discussion on lessons learned, areas of the collaboration that worked well, and points to ponder on improving future library/IPE collaborations.
