Students' approaches to learning in clinical interprofessional context.

Area of Science:

• Health Professions Education
• Interprofessional Learning
• Medical Education

Background:

• Effective healthcare delivery relies on interprofessional teamwork.
• Undergraduate health professions students require training in collaboration.
• Student acceptance of interprofessional learning environments varies with study approach.

Purpose of the Study:

• To examine how health care students' evaluations of interprofessional clinical training correlate with their individual study orientations.

Main Methods:

• 369 students (nursing, medical, physiotherapy, occupational therapy) participated in an interprofessional education (IPE) course.
• Questionnaires assessed study orientations and attitudes towards clinical training and IPE pre- and post-course.
• Cluster analysis grouped students based on learning orientations into distinct study groups.

Main Results:

• Three student clusters emerged: Low collaboration, Collaborative Constructivist, and Cookbook.
• These clusters differed in terms of student profession and perceptions of the interprofessional learning environment.
• The 'Cookbook' group demonstrated improved understanding of interprofessional collaboration post-course.

Conclusions:

• Student learning orientations significantly impact their perception of interprofessional training.
• Instructional strategies should consider diverse student study approaches for effective IPE.
• A 'Cookbook' learning approach, when addressed, can lead to enhanced interprofessional collaboration understanding.