Evaluating Inter-professional Education in Respiratory Care: A Survey of Perceptions of Collaboration

Abstract

Background:

Interprofessional education (IPE) refers to when two or more professionals learn with, from, and about each other to improve collaboration and the quality of patient care. The purpose of the study was to evaluate pre-licensure IPE and its perceptions of collaboration.

Methods:

For this cross-sectional study, a survey consisting of 42 items was distributed via social media in April 2002 to respiratory therapists (RT) 18 or older. RT education and 42 questions related to interdisciplinary collaboration covering the four subscales of interdependence and flexibility, newly created professional activities, collective ownership of goals, and reflection on practice derived from the Modified Index of Interdisciplinary Collaboration (MIIC). The MIIC questions used a Likert-type scale scored from 1 = strongly disagree to 5 = strongly agree.

Results:

Descriptive statistics of the two groups with 65 in low IPE (<9 hours IPE) and 38 in high IPE group (>9 hours IPE) which was significantly unbalanced. The mean (1.15) and median (1.17) for the low IPE group versus high IPE group mean (2.03) and median (1.64) respectively. The SD and range for low versus high were low SD 0.856 range -1.14 to 2.87 and high SD 2.06 range -0.620 and 7.63. The smaller high group has significantly more variance and skew than the larger low group. The groups were evaluated with the Spier rouge test for normality and median and Levine’s test for homogeneity of variance. A directional nonparametric Mann-Whitney U test for differences of mean was significant P = .042 and a mean difference of -0.430 between the groups. Resulting base factor in favor of the hypothesis of difference was 22.8 providing strong evidence of the difference in means between the two groups.

Conclusions:

Although there were limitations to this study due to the unbalanced group sizes, variance in the high IPE group, and relied on IPE recalled memories during pre-licensure training. The study does hint at the idea there may be a significant difference in the post-licensure measure of collaboration for those who had a significant amount of their IPE in their pre-licensure education. This is congruent with studies in other health care populations. It supports CoARC's inclusion of IPE for RT programs and the use of IPE to support improved collaboration post-licensure and its benefits. Future work related to the study includes refining the measures of IPE to identify what levels and types of IPE more effectively may affect collaboration.