Implementation and impact of an interprofessional education curriculum on medical, pharmacy, and social work students' attitudes, perceptions, and self-assessed teamwork skills

Health professionals are actively contributing to interprofessional collaboration, yet implementation and assessment of interprofessional education (IPE) within Family Medicine is not well documented. From October 2014 to December 2018, social work, pharmacy, and medical students worked as an IP team involving inpatient, outpatient, and home visit experiences. Students completed two validated surveys pre- and post- their interprofessional education rotation: the Interdisciplinary Education Perception Scale (IEPS) and the Teams Skills Scale (TSS). Paired t-test analyses were conducted on individual pre- and post-survey scores. Twenty-seven (77%) of the 35 participating students completed pre- and post-surveys. Significant differences were found in mean change in pre-IEPS mean scores (4.95) and post-IEPS mean scores (5.29), with a mean difference in matched pairs of 0.31 (p < .001, p = 27). A significant difference was found in student pre-TSS mean scores (3.52) and post-TSS mean scores (4.31), with a mean difference in matched pairs of 0.79 (p < .0001, p = 27). Our findings demonstrate that the IPE curriculum had a positive impact on students' attitudes and self-assessed teamwork skills, with greater learning outcomes identified amongst pharmacy and social work students than medical students. Implementing IP curriculum into Family Medicine experiences is both feasible and worthy of further investigation.