Nurse Perceptions of Artists as Collaborators in Interprofessional Care Teams

Increased attention is being given to interprofessional collaboration in healthcare, which has been shown to improve patient satisfaction, patient safety, healthcare processes, and health outcomes. As the arts and artists are being more widely incorporated into healthcare settings throughout the world, professional artists are contributing to interprofessional care teams. A secondary directed content analysis of interviews with 31 nurses on a medical-surgical care unit investigated the roles and impacts of professional artists on the interprofessional care team. The investigation utilized established domains of interprofessional care, including values and ethics, roles and responsibilities, interprofessional communication, and teams and teamwork, and created the domain of quality of care. Findings suggest that artists are valued by nurses as members of the interprofessional care team, that they enhance the provision of patient-centered care, and that they improve quality of care by providing holistic dimensions of caring, including cognitive and social engagement, and meaningful interaction. The presence of artists on interprofessional teams provides a cost-effective and welcome resource for clinical staff and builds a culture in which creativity and interdisciplinary collaboration are more highly valued and activated.