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Dankwah J1, Quartey J1, Kwakye S2, Acheampong K1
1University of Ghana, Physiotherapy, Accra, Ghana, 2West Africa Football Academy, Physiotherapy, Sogakope, Ghana
Background: Interprofessional education (IPE) is an important academic approach for preparing health-care students to provide patient care in a collaborative team environment, which improves patient care outcomes and increases patient satisfaction. Interprofessional education is effective in teaching students the roles of other health care professions and changes students' attitudes towards them. The need for health-care team members who provide high-quality care in the most collaborative and competent way led to the definition of interprofessional education. Each member of a health-care team needs to understand the role of other members from different professions using appropriate communication and conflict-management skills.
Purpose: Interprofessional education has been shown to eliminate segmented education between health-care professionals, and thus renounces hierarchies, misperceptions and miscommunications. Casual conversations by the researchers in some leading hospitals in Accra, Ghana revealed that most health-care professionals do not possess sufficient knowledge of the role of other members from different professions in the treatment of patients. Hence, the primary purpose of the study was to determine the attitudes of allied health students towards interprofessional education and their readiness towards participation in interprofessional education activities.
Methods: Two-hundred and twenty-nine (229) second to fourth year University of Ghana allied health students recruited from the departments of physiotherapy, dietetics, dental laboratory science, occupational therapy, medical laboratory science and diagnostic radiography/radiotherapy were involved in this cross-sectional study. A data capturing form was used to obtain the demographic details of the participants. The readiness for interprofessional education scale was used to obtain data about attitudes and readiness of allied health students towards interprofessional education. The demographic details and responses of the participants were analyzed and described as frequencies and percentages. Differences between groups based on the levels and programmes of study respectively were determined using on one-way ANOVA.
Results: The study comprised of 71-second year, 73 third year and 85 fourth year students respectively, of which 119 (52%) were males and 110 (48%) were females. Majority (155) of the participants had previous experience in health setup and the remaining 74 (32.3%) had no previous experience in health setup. The overall response of allied health students' attitudes and readiness towards interprofessional education was high. The attitudes and readiness of the students towards interprofessional education did not differ between the different levels of study (F ratio (degrees of freedom = 5,223) = 0.015, p=0.985) and the various programmes of study (F ratio (degrees of freedom = 5,223) = 0.566, p=0.726).
Conclusion(s): The study revealed that allied health students value teamwork and collaboration have positive attitudes towards interprofessional education and appear ready for participation in interprofessional education activities.
Implications: Promoting interprofessional education may be helpful for multidisciplinary teamwork and clinical learning of students.
Keywords: Attitudes, readiness, interprofessional education
Funding acknowledgements: None
Purpose: Interprofessional education has been shown to eliminate segmented education between health-care professionals, and thus renounces hierarchies, misperceptions and miscommunications. Casual conversations by the researchers in some leading hospitals in Accra, Ghana revealed that most health-care professionals do not possess sufficient knowledge of the role of other members from different professions in the treatment of patients. Hence, the primary purpose of the study was to determine the attitudes of allied health students towards interprofessional education and their readiness towards participation in interprofessional education activities.
Methods: Two-hundred and twenty-nine (229) second to fourth year University of Ghana allied health students recruited from the departments of physiotherapy, dietetics, dental laboratory science, occupational therapy, medical laboratory science and diagnostic radiography/radiotherapy were involved in this cross-sectional study. A data capturing form was used to obtain the demographic details of the participants. The readiness for interprofessional education scale was used to obtain data about attitudes and readiness of allied health students towards interprofessional education. The demographic details and responses of the participants were analyzed and described as frequencies and percentages. Differences between groups based on the levels and programmes of study respectively were determined using on one-way ANOVA.
Results: The study comprised of 71-second year, 73 third year and 85 fourth year students respectively, of which 119 (52%) were males and 110 (48%) were females. Majority (155) of the participants had previous experience in health setup and the remaining 74 (32.3%) had no previous experience in health setup. The overall response of allied health students' attitudes and readiness towards interprofessional education was high. The attitudes and readiness of the students towards interprofessional education did not differ between the different levels of study (F ratio (degrees of freedom = 5,223) = 0.015, p=0.985) and the various programmes of study (F ratio (degrees of freedom = 5,223) = 0.566, p=0.726).
Conclusion(s): The study revealed that allied health students value teamwork and collaboration have positive attitudes towards interprofessional education and appear ready for participation in interprofessional education activities.
Implications: Promoting interprofessional education may be helpful for multidisciplinary teamwork and clinical learning of students.
Keywords: Attitudes, readiness, interprofessional education
Funding acknowledgements: None
Topic: Education
Ethics approval required: Yes
Institution: University of Ghana
Ethics committee: Ethics and Protocol Review Committee
Ethics number: SBAHS-PH./10513879/SA/2017-2018
All authors, affiliations and abstracts have been published as submitted.
