Collaborative Clinical Placements: Interactions Among Students From Different Programs.

Area of Science:

• Health Professions Education
• Interprofessional Collaboration
• Nursing Education

Background:

• Canadian healthcare faces clinical placement shortages for students.
• Innovative solutions are needed to increase placement capacity.
• Shared placements offer a potential solution by integrating diverse student groups.

Purpose of the Study:

• To describe a shared clinical placement model for bachelor of nursing, practical nurse, and health care aide students.
• To evaluate the effectiveness of shared placements in increasing capacity and fostering collaboration.

Main Methods:

• A qualitative interview approach was employed.
• Data collection focused on student experiences within shared placements.

Main Results:

• Students gained valuable insights into the roles of other healthcare providers.
• Enhanced understanding of care coordination among diverse student groups was observed.
• Challenges included inter-student competition for clinical procedure practice and communication difficulties when sharing patient care.

Conclusions:

• Shared placements partially met the goals of increasing student placement capacity.
• The approach showed promise in expanding interprofessional collaboration opportunities.
• Further refinement is needed to address identified challenges in shared clinical education models.