Available online 7 December 2023, 103864

Author links open overlay panel, , , ABSTRACTAim and Background

Patient safety is a global health priority as unsafe care is a principal cause of death and disability. Ineffective interprofessional communication and collaboration among nursing and medical professionals and students contribute to unsafe practices. Interprofessional education provides opportunities to strengthen nurse-physician collaboration and enhance patient care. However, there is inconclusive evidence regarding interprofessional education effectiveness. This review aims to systematically evaluate interprofessional education effectiveness for nursing and medical professionals and students on interprofessional educational outcomes (interprofessional attitudes, perceptions, skills, knowledge, behaviours, and organisational and patient outcomes).

Design and Methods

PubMed, Cochrane Library, Embase, Scopus, CINAHL, ERIC, PsycInfo, Web of Science were last searched on 13 January 2022. This review included published and unpublished randomised controlled trials, quasi-experimental and mixed-method studies in English examining interprofessional education outcomes among nursing and medical professionals and students. Two reviewers independently appraised studies using the Joanna Briggs Institute Critical Appraisal Tools and extracted data using a modified Joanna Briggs Institute data extraction form. Narrative synthesis was conducted instead of meta-analysis since majority of the included studies had quasi-experimental design, and various interventions and outcomes. Certainty of evidence was appraised using the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development and Evaluations tool.

Results

This review included 15 studies involving 1185 participants. Improvements were reported in each interprofessional educational outcome after interprofessional education. High-fidelity simulation with multiple scenarios, standardised communication tools, didactic and active learning methods, theoretical frameworks, debriefing sessions and provider training enhanced interprofessional education effectiveness.

Conclusions

Effectiveness of interprofessional education for nursing and medical professionals and students was demonstrated since improvements were observed for each interprofessional educational outcome. This systematic review addressed literature gaps, demonstrated effectiveness of interprofessional education in clinical practice and academic curricula and provided evidence-based insights that future research can consider to enhance global patient safety standards for optimal patient outcomes and quality of healthcare. Caution is advised in interpreting findings due to ‘very low’ evidence certainty and limited studies. More high-quality randomised controlled trials with longitudinal designs are needed.

Section snippetsINTRODUCTION

Patient safety is defined as the absence of unnecessary adverse events and prevention of avoidable harm by healthcare personnel ( World Health Organisation 2021). Unsafe patient care, which refers to adverse incidents resulting in patient harm (World Health Organisation 2019), is a leading cause of mortality and morbidity worldwide and significantly contributes to the global burden of disease (World Health Organisation 2021). Approximately 134 million adverse events and 2.6 million deaths occur

METHODS

This review adhered to the Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) Manual for Evidence Synthesis (Aromataris and Munn, 2020) and Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) checklist (Page et al., 2021).

Search results

The search process is illustrated in the PRISMA flow diagram (Fig. 1) (Moher et al., 2009). The search retrieved 970 records across eight databases, and 24 records from reference lists, journals and grey literature. After removing 326 duplicates, the titles and abstracts of 668 records were screened. Three hundred and sixty-two records with irrelevant titles and 245 records with ineligible abstracts were excluded. Upon examining the full texts of 61 articles for eligibility, 46 articles were

Summary of findings

This review examined the effectiveness of interprofessional education on interprofessional educational outcomes. The findings in this review revealed that interprofessional education improved interprofessional attitudes, perceptions, skills, knowledge and behaviour among nursing and medical professionals and students, and organisational and patient outcomes.

Attitudes and perceptions

Interprofessional education improved interprofessional attitudes and perceptions among nursing and medical professionals and students. This

CONCLUSION

In conclusion, this review examined the effectiveness of interprofessional education on interprofessional educational outcomes and found improvements in interprofessional attitudes, perceptions, skills, knowledge and behaviours among nursing and medical professionals and students as well as in organisational and patient outcomes. However, caution is advised when interpreting the findings since the certainty in evidence was ‘very low’ for each outcome and a limited number of studies were

Uncited references

(Cajal et al., (2020)

FUNDING

The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this paper.

Declaration of Competing Interest

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper

ACKNOWLEDGEMNTS

The authors would like to thank the National University of Singapore for their support and contribution to this study. The author would also like to thank Dr. Noreen Ishak from the Research Support Unit, National University Health System, Singapore for her guidance and coaching in the writing of the manuscript.

CONFLICT OF INTEREST STATEMENT

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

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