Case-based learning in cross-professional groups - the development of a pre-registration interprofessional learning...

This paper describes the development and evaluation of an interprofessional learning (IPL) programme at the pre-registration level. The principal aim of the study was to investigate whether case-based learning in cross-professional groups is a feasible and an effective way to conduct interprofessional education (IPE). Student volunteers from five different health professional training programmes were allocated to two groups: an intervention group and a control group. Interprofessional attitudes of all students were measured at the beginning and at the end of the study. Group members fed back their views about their learning experience after the 9-week long intervention. The study reports significant effects of the intervention on students' attitudes to different health professions. For example, students in the intervention group tended to view each profession as more 'caring' when compared to the control group. Student feedback was positive, with the main message to integrate the programme in the timetable and to introduce an opportunity for IPE in future years. The initial findings reported in this paper show that this is a feasible and an effective way to deliver IPE across the wide range of professions in the study and that the learning programme was viewed positively by the students who took part.