Impact Of Inter-Professional Education On Nursing Student Outcomes In The Online Environment

Abstract

The implementation and integration of inter-professional education (IPE) into a curriculum is supported by the National Council of State Boards of Nursing (NCSBN), the Inter-professional Education Collaborative (IPEC), and the Institute of Medicine’s (IOM) Future of Nursing report. While there is support for implementation, there is a lack of data and guidelines which to follow currently. The purpose of this nursing research study was to investigate the impact of inter-professional collaboration on nursing student outcomes in the online environment. A co-teaching model was implemented within an online environment to provide inter-professionally lead nursing sciences courses to nursing students in a baccalaureate program. In the four sessions following the implementation of interdisciplinary collaborative teaching, 605 students completed the courses with 179 submitting the end of course survey. Results indicated that the overall student satisfaction rating with the pathophysiology online course was significant at p < 0.05 following the implementation of inter-professional teaching methodology. Prior to implementation of collaborative teaching, the total enrollment in pathophysiology was 194. After the institution of collaborative teaching, the total student enrollment was 605. This reflected a significant increase in student enrollment of 311%. Today, the complex healthcare delivery system necessitates a shift from traditional education to an inter-professional collaborative teaching model that generates knowledge from interaction with a variety of educators from a variety of disciplines (Hean, Craddock, & Hammick, 2012). Nursing curricula is needed which fosters both an inter-professional learning of shared knowledge and the discipline-specific learning essential for professional practice.