Educating interprofessional learners for quality, safety and systems improvement.

Area of Science:

• Healthcare Education
• Quality Improvement
• Patient Safety

Background:

• Health professionals often lack essential skills for effective healthcare systems improvement.
• Competencies in systems improvement and interprofessional collaboration are inadequately addressed in current educational curricula.
• There is a critical need for improved training models to equip healthcare professionals for quality and safety initiatives.

Purpose of the Study:

• To introduce the Achieving Competence Today (ACT) program, a novel interprofessional education model.
• To describe the ACT curriculum designed for quality, safety, and health systems improvement.
• To discuss strategies for optimizing interprofessional learning within the ACT program.

Main Methods:

• The ACT program utilizes a four-module, active learning course structure.
• Learners from diverse disciplines collaborate on developing a Quality Improvement Project.
• The project aims to address a real-world quality or safety issue within the learners' practice systems.

Main Results:

• The ACT program provides a structured framework for interprofessional education in systems improvement.
• Active learning and collaborative project development foster practical skill acquisition.
• The model is designed to enhance interprofessional collaboration for tangible practice changes.

Conclusions:

• The ACT program offers a viable model for interprofessional education in quality and safety.
• Effective implementation of ACT can improve healthcare professionals' competencies in systems improvement.
• Further development and dissemination of ACT are recommended for broader impact on healthcare quality.