Interprofessional education and collaborative practice in Kuwait: attitudes and perceptions of health sciences students

ABSTRACT

Interprofessional education (IPE) prepares health students to become collaboration-ready healthcare professionals. Assessing students’ baseline attitudes toward IPE and collaborative practice is essential to inform development of IPE curricula. Kuwait University Health Sciences Center (HSC) is early in its IPE journey but is planning to join the broader global movement toward IPE. A cross-sectional survey was conducted to explore the attitudes of HSC students from Faculties of Medicine, Dentistry, Pharmacy, and Allied Health Sciences toward collaborative practice and IPE at early and late stages of study. A total of 770 students completed the survey (81.1% response rate). Students expressed positive attitudes toward interprofessional healthcare teams and IPE (median [IQR] overall attitudes were rated 4.0 [1.0] and 4.0 [2.0], respectively, on a scale of 5). Overall attitudes toward both scales were significantly more positive among pharmacy students than students from other faculties (p < .001). Final-year students reported more positive attitudes toward healthcare teams than early- and middle-year students, while early- and final-year students expressed more positive attitudes toward IPE than middle-year students (p < .001). There were no significant differences in overall attitudes between female and male students toward the two scales (p > .05). These findings have implications for engaging students from different professions in IPE initiatives.

KEYWORDS:

• Team-based patient care
• student attitudes
• interprofessional education
• interprofessional collaborative practice

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank all the students who participated in the study. We are grateful to Ms Reny Varghese for her valuable assistance in data entry from the questionnaires into the software used for statistical analysis.

Disclosure statement

The authors report no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of this article.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Maram G. Katoue

Maram G. Katoue is a pharmacist and an Associate Teaching Assistant at the Department of Pharmacology and Therapeutics, Kuwait University Faculty of Pharmacy. Ms. Katoue holds BSc degree in Pharmacy, MSc degree in Pharmacology, and MSc degree in Diabetes Care and Education. She served as a member of the Interprofessional Education Committee at Kuwait University Health Sciences Center. Her research interests include pharmacy education, clinical skills development, interprofessional education, and research related to pharmacy practice.

Abdelmoneim I. Awad

Abdelmoneim I. Awad is a Professor of Clinical Pharmacy at the Department of Pharmacy Practice, Kuwait University Faculty of Pharmacy. He was previously the Chair of the Department of Pharmacy Practice at Kuwait University (2010-2017). He has served as a Chair of the Departmental Research Committee, member of the Faculty of Pharmacy Research Committee, and the Health Sciences Center Ethical Committee. His main research interests are in clinical and outcome research, use of medicines and medication safety, pharmacy practice, and pharmacy education.

Alan W. Dow

Alan W. Dow is a general internist, the Seymour and Ruth Perlin Professor of Medicine and Health Administration, and the Assistant Vice President of Health Sciences for Interprofessional Education and Collaborative Care at the Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, Virginia, USA.

Terry L. Schwinghammer

Terry L. Schwinghammer PharmD FCCP FASHP FAPhA is Professor Emeritus at the West Virginia University (WVU) School of Pharmacy in Morgantown, WV, USA. He was previously the Arthur I. Jacknowitz Distinguished Chair in Clinical Pharmacy and Chair of the Department of Clinical Pharmacy at WVU (2005-2018).