Queen’s to develop team-based health education model
Thursday June 30, 2005
(Kingston, ON) – Queen’s University’s Faculty of Health Sciences has received $1.2 million from Health Canada to incorporate an “inter-professional team” approach into its education and training programs for medical, rehab therapy and nursing students.
Called QUIPPED (Queen’s University Inter-Professional Patient-Centred Education Direction), the new program was officially launched today by Kingston MP and Speaker of the House of Commons Peter Milliken.
Also funded under the $13-million program are projects from: the University of Toronto, UBC, Dalhousie, the Calgary Health Region, University of Manitoba, Memorial University, University of Saskatchewan, McGill, Laval, and the Council of Ontario Universities.
“Because Queen’s is one of the few Canadian universities to have a combined Faculty of Health Sciences, we are extremely well-positioned to implement Health Canada’s new model of inter-professional teams of health care providers,” says Dean of Health Sciences Dr. David Walker.
“The collaborative relationships among colleagues at our schools of Medicine, Nursing, and Rehabilitation Therapy have enabled the steering group to move forward with their innovative plan,” notes Dr. Walker. “QUIPPED will mirror the research environment already in existence at Queen’s.” Professional development for faculty and community practitioners is an integral part of the new initiative, the dean adds.
Co-leaders of the project are Drs. Sarita Verma (Medicine), Jennifer Medves (Nursing), and Margo Paterson (Rehabilitation Therapy). With their educational partner, the Eastern Ontario School of X Ray Technology, they join clinical partners from the South-Eastern Ontario Health Sciences Centre, North Kingston Community Health Centre, and the Weeneebayko Health Ahtuskaywin, in efforts to enhance health system efficiency while providing more patient-centred care.
The three-year project will:
· Establish an infrastructure to support inter-professional education
· Develop innovative clinical opportunities for students where collaborative practice is modeled
· Provide educational sessions for faculty to enhance teaching of inter-professional collaborative practice
· Align undergraduate programs to mesh inter-professional learning opportunities throughout the curriculum
· Establish a network of patients as educators for health care professionals
The new approach should reduce duplication in courses provided by the three schools, and generate much better class discussion, the project co-leaders suggest. “For our health sciences students, particularly in medicine, this will very significantly change the way they are educated at Queen’s,” says Dr. Verma, associate dean of postgraduate education for Health Sciences. “If you truly believe in problem-based learning, there’s no reason why we shouldn’t teach in each other’s schools.”
Another important element of the new curriculum is the role of patients as educators and “real life” models of collaborative team practice. “By including patients on our QUIPPED steering committee, we’ve attempted to build into the teaching process a component that has already worked well in nursing and rehabilitation programs,” says Dr. Medves, the director of Queen’s Practice and Research in Nursing Group. “It’s important to teach faculty and students what it means to be a patient in the health care system.”
This type of “critical action research” – where the consumers (patients) collaborate with the learners – has proved very successful in the U.S. and Australia to date, but has not yet been implemented in Canada, notes Dr. Paterson.
“What’s most exciting is that QUIPPED provides an excellent model for the way health care professionals should function in society today,” says Dr. Verma. “It will truly be a revolution – as well as an evolution – in health care delivery.”
Contacts:
Nancy Dorrance, Queen’s News & Media Services, 613.533.2869
Lorinda Peterson, Queen’s News & Media Services, 613.533.3234
Attention broadcasters: Queen’s now has facilities to provide broadcast quality audio and video feeds. For television interviews, we can provide a live, real-time double ender from Kingston fibre optic cable. Please call for details.
