The Commission on Dental Accreditation standards require that dental and dental hygiene learners participate in interprofessional education (IPE) during their academic training. IPE is an integral step towards developing practitioners who understand their own roles, the roles of other health professionals, and who can effectively communicate and collaborate with other providers. An initial step in the acquisition and application of IPE is for students to perceive it as relevant. Learners who appreciate the relevance of a topic are more likely to engage with the material and, in the case of IPE, better represent their respective professions while interacting with other health professional students. We will share results of a study with students from dental hygiene (BS; n=50) and dental (DDS, n=114) programs who were enrolled in introductory IPE at two large, urban universities with academic medical centers. The course/curriculum at each site differs, but the experience spans an entire semester at one site and an academic year at the other. The Student Perceptions of Interprofessional Clinical Education, revised version 2 (SPICE-R2) measure was used in a retrospective pretest-posttest design at both sites. There was a positive significant difference between pre-post scores for the total scale and the three factors of teamwork, roles/responsibilities, and patient outcomes from collaborative practice. The difference was greatest with attitudes regarding roles/responsibilities. There were no significant differences between sites on the degree of change in scores, but there were differences between professions, with dental hygiene showing larger gains than dental students with respect to attitudes about roles/responsibilities. Results indicate oral health learners’ interprofessional attitudes improve with IPE, but suggest dental students’ perception of their role and other team members’ roles are not as clearly defined after engagement in IPE.
Disclosures:
In accordance with the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education’s Standards for Commercial Support, adopted by the Joint Accreditors for Interprofessional Continuing Education, the National Center for Interprofessional Practice and Education has a conflict of interest policy that requires that all individuals involved in the development of activity content disclose their relevant financial relationships with commercial interests. All potential conflicts of interest that arise based upon these financial relationships are resolved prior to the educational activity.
Adelita Cantu, Rebekah Salt, Sadie Trammell Velasquez, David Ojeda Diaz, Diane Ferguson, Debbie Chang, Jeff Jackson, Cristina Grijalva, Stephanie de Sam Lazaro, Adele Della Torre, Jayne-Marie Raponi, Amy Blue, Kiran Lukose, Kelly Lockeman, Tina Gunaldo, Sharon Lanning, Michelle McGregor, Jessica Owens
declare no vested interest in or affiliation with any commercial interest offering financial support for this interprofessional continuing education activity, or any affiliation with a commercial interest whose philosophy could potentially bias their presentation.
