Facilitating undergraduate interprofessional learning in healthcare: comparing classroom and clinical learning for nursing and medical students

Abstract There has been increasing emphasis on the important role that interprofessional education (IPE) must play in educating and developing present and future healthcare professionals. However, clarity is urgently needed regarding appropriate strategies for its timing, content, delivery and assessment. This study focuses on the development of an undergraduate IPE programme for medical and nursing students. It compares learning opportunities in classroom and clinical areas and identifies suitable pedagogical strategies and subject areas. The programme consisted of 2 weeks of classroom‐based learning for all 130 participating students, followed by 6 weeks on shared placement for 35 of the 113 medical and all 17 nursing students. A triangulation of data‐collection methods was used to help strengthen reliability and validity and provide a more comprehensive analysis. In both classroom and clinical areas, successful methods of delivery for IPE were those that enabled exchanges of perspectives. Ward‐based IPE was regarded as particularly effective in encouraging students to begin to feel part of a clinical team. In contrast, classroom‐based learning enabled them to know about teamwork, but not to experience it. Practical issues of shift and timetable incompatibility were the most significant barriers to successful placement‐shared learning. Developments in this area will need to focus on those elements of clinical practice which bring students together for collaborative involvement in activities that maximize the benefits resulting from the investment of time and effort involved. We conclude that undergraduate IPE opportunities have an important role to play in enabling students to learn about the roles and responsibilities of others and the impact of this on their own practice. It should be the first step towards developing practitioners who, whilst retaining their own unique professional identity, are able to understand and respect the roles of other healthcare professionals and work collaboratively to improve patient care.