Awarded by the National Center for Interprofessional Practice and Education to the University of Maryland Interprofessional Team Care Clinics in Montgomery County, Maryland.

Congratulations to the 2020 Thibault Nexus Award recipient at the single-system level, the University of Maryland, Baltimore, for its initiative Interprofessional Team Care Clinics in Montgomery County, Maryland. The Thibault Nexus Award is awarded annually to an exemplary model of a “Nexus” partnership between practice and education for improved patient and community outcomes.

The University of Maryland Interprofessional Team Care Clinic project, established in 2014 between University of Maryland, Holy Cross Health Network, and Mercy Health Clinic, was selected as an awardee of the Accelerating Interprofessional Community-Based Education and Practice initiative. Through this supportive developmental program, the Interprofessional Team Care Clinic model was replicated to two additional clinics.“

Students from Pharmacy, Doctor of Nursing Practice, Social Work, and Nutrition see underserved, complex medical patients as a team to provide medication, nutrition, and chronic disease education, medical management, psychosocial triage, and assistance with access to community resources,” describes Dr. Gina Rowe, Assistant Professor of Family and Community Heath, and Accelerating initiative principal investigator.

The Interprofessional Team Care Clinics have shown clinically meaningful improvements in patient outcomes (hemoglobin A1C levels, blood pressure, and lipid panels), and learning and attitude outcomes among the more than 130 students participating in the three clinic sites.

“We’ve had a lot of lessons learned,” shares Dr. Heather Congdon, Co-Director, University of Maryland Center for Interprofessional Education, “We’ve learned that collaboration is important not only among participating disciplines on the academic side, but also equally, if not more importantly, with the healthcare community partners.”

Click on the video below to listen to Drs. Rowe and Congdon, along with their own interprofessional faculty team, share their keys for success, along with more details on the clinics’ innovative responses to COVID-19.