Novel model to teach health care delivery in geriatrics

ABSTRACT

Introducing health policy to interprofessional graduate students, anchoring health policy to older adult health needs, while conveying how current policy issues will affect their individual careers is challenging, yet essential, for health profession education. This novel program integrated graduate level health profession learners from medicine, nurse practitioner, pharmacy, psychology, social work, physical therapy and occupational therapy disciplines. The aim was to embed health policy into an existing interprofessional (IP) geriatrics course at an academic medical center. Selection of disciplines was based on prior collaborative work and faculty interest. The objectives were to 1. Introduce current health policies that affect older adults; 2. Understand the effects of health policy and social determinants of health on the older adults in their future practice; 3. Challenge learners to apply their knowledge and develop health advocacy strategies for older adults; and 4) Teach the importance of teamwork in interprofessional practice within a geriatric population.

The health policy curriculum impacted 487 learners for 12 sessions over three years. Four themes emerged with the sessions: health policy awareness, interprofessional appreciation, patient care “pearls,” and pharmacological considerations in geriatrics. Each of the eight modules generated thoughtful recommendations by the learners, providing a glimpse into future workforce priorities.

KEYWORDS:

• Geriatric health policy
• interprofessional education
• academic medical center
• geriatric education
• interprofessional relations
• teaching tool

Introduction

The recent global decline in fertility and mortality, coupled with the increase in life expectancy, has ushered the world into an era of population aging. Population aging can be defined as the change in the age composition of a population toward older ages (≥65 years of age), with the number of older adults increasing relative to the number of younger people (Harper, Lyons, & Potter, 2019). Although population aging is a global phenomenon, substantial variability exists between geographic areas and population groups (Harper et al., 2019). This requires the contribution and collaboration of all health professionals to provide quality care and understand healthcare delivery to older adults across multiple settings. In geriatrics, interprofessional education (IPE) models have been used internationally for geriatric syndromes, however not specifically for geriatric health policy. Dementia care management, teaching the 5 M Framework outlined by the American Geriatrics Society, palliative care, falls risk assessments, and many other geriatric syndromes have been presented using an IPE model. (Brown et al., 2018; Dreier-Wolfgramm et al., 2017; Fulton et al., 2020; Schwartz et al., 2020). Most were performed during the clinical training years for students and faculty, after the didactic years, or as a one-workshop session. However, IPE programs in geriatric policy and population health were not found. This program intervention adds to the current literature by providing a platform for a two-year curriculum to provide continuous exposure to geriatric policy and population health for interprofessional learners at the graduate-school level.

The writers intentionally chose to embed health policy and population health content into an IPE geriatric course platform with learners from seven health professions. IPE offers health profession learners opportunities to learn from, with and about each other. The World Health Organization recognized IPE in the Aging 2020 Report proposing that the interprofessional model will ensure optimal health care (World Health Organization, 2020). Within an IP model of teaching, opportunities present themselves that can lead to communication and collaboration that informs learning in ways that may not be accomplished through more traditional teaching models. These opportunities for collaboration are consistent with the findings of an expert panel that was convened in 2011 and published a document describing core competencies for interprofessional practice. Panel experts were representatives of the American Association of Colleges of Nursing, American Association of Colleges of Osteopathic Medicine, American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy, American Dental Education Association, Association of American Medical Colleges, and Associations of Schools of Public Health (Core Competencies for Interprofessional Collaborative Practice Report of an Expert Panel, 2011). The panel envisioned interprofessional practice as key to safe, high quality, and accessible, patient-centered care. They noted that achieving the vision of interprofessional practice requires the continuous development of interprofessional competencies by health profession students as they learn to integrate these competencies into practice. Fully integrated interprofessional competencies support effective teamwork as they enter practice. This interprofessional document, through consensus of five professions, has guided much of the work toward interprofessional practice models since its publication ten years ago (Core Competencies for Interprofessional Collaborative Practice Report of an Expert Panel, 2011).

The IPE geriatrics course, “Geriatrics Champions Program,” was taught with the team-based learning (TBL) model. TBL was chosen as the format since it provided learner accountability, a good format for teaching large audiences and an interactive component (Sisk, 2011). A traditional TBL model was used with 10-question individual and team Readiness Assessment Tests (iRAT, tRAT) in electronic format, case discussions, simultaneous reporting and evaluation.

The policy component was embedded as a one-hour prework assignment per session, one written assignment per session and small-group discussion during the course’s case discussion. Objectives were to 1. Introduce current health policies that affect health care provision to the older adults; 2. Allow learners to understand the effects of health policy and social determinants of health on older adults in their future practice; 3. Challenge learners to apply their knowledge and develop health advocacy strategies to meet the needs of older adults; and 4) Teach the importance of teamwork in interprofessional practice within a geriatric population.

Material and method

Institutional Review Board approval was obtained for this study. A team of faculty was recruited from seven professions to facilitate the Geriatrics Champions Program (GCP) course and the embedded policy curriculum. All understood the importance of incorporating geriatrics, accepted team-based learning as the course platform and agreed to the task of content lead. The two-year Geriatrics Champions Program (GCP) aimed to achieve Kirkpatrick Level 3 evaluative data (Yardley & Dornan, 2012). The Kirkpatrick model is a globally recognized method of evaluating learning tools. Level 1 focuses on learner reaction, level 2 on learning, level 3 learner behavior changes and level 4 result changes (Yardley & Dornan, 2012). It taught geriatric competencies to Family Medicine (FM) residents and graduate learners from the Schools of Social Work (SW), Pharmacy (RX), Advanced Practice Nursing (NP), Occupational Therapy (OT), Psychology (Psych), Physical Therapy (PT) and Medicine (SOM). Competencies were divided into eight domains. Seven domains used the structure of the Minimum Geriatric Competencies for IM-FM Residents document tailored for medicine learners (Williams et al., 2010). An additional domain was created introducing geriatric demography, function and caregiver burden. In addition to the IM-FM competencies, most professions had geriatric competencies, which were strategically matched to the appropriate domains to allow for all learners to achieve their respective competencies (Adult-Gerontology Acute Care Nurse Practitioner Competencies, 2012; ASCP Geriatric Pharmacy Curriculum Guide, 21; Competencies, 21; Essential Competencies in the Care of Older Adults at the Completion of a Physical Therapist Postprofessional Program of Study, 2021; Geriatric Social Work Competency Scale II with Life-long Leadership Skills, 21). The two-year courses had four sessions annually, each covering one domain. The domains were Geriatric Demography; Cognitive, Affective and Behavioral Health; Medication Management; Ambulatory Care; Palliative and End of Life Care; Hospital Patient Safety; Transitions of Care; Complex and Chronic Illnesses in Older Adults.

The GCP was a six-year program (three two-year cycles) that ran from 2009 to 2016; the geriatric health policy component was from 2013 to 2016. The course recruited health profession learners from the Schools of Medicine (SOM), Social Work (SW), Pharmacy (RX), Advanced Practice Nursing (NP), Occupational Therapy (OT), Psychology (Psych), Physical Therapy (PT), and Family Medicine (FM) residents. The four annual GCP sessions were mandatory for the FM and NP cohorts; voluntary for the remainder. Sessions were scheduled around each cohort’s academic calendar (September, November, February, and April). There were 170–200 learners annually. The profession-specific breakdown is in Table 1 and the numbers of learners annually is in Table 2 . The learners and faculty were divided into 20, 8-person, interprofessional teams of varying numbers from each discipline, depending on student numbers. Teams and team facilitators created a unit by naming themselves and stayed united for the year. According to Steven et al., facilitating student leadership is essential to the success of interprofessional education (Steven et al., 2016). The course embedded this pearl by tasking each team to select a student scribe and speaker for each session, allowing them to lead the team. Each team had one to two faculty

Table 1 Individual Breakdown by Health Profession

Health profession	Percent
Dietetics	0.3%
Family Medicine - Resident	8.0%
Nursing - AG Tract	11.1%
Nursing - PC Tract	21.1%
Occupational Therapy	18.8%
Pharmacy	17.6%
Psychology	1.3%
Physical Therapy	18.8%
Social Work	3.0%
Total	100.0%

Table 2 Summary of learner and faculty numbers by year

Year	Learners	Faculty	Policy component included?
1	134	16	No
2	147	30	No
3	150	33	Yes
4	195	36	Yes
5	142	36	Yes

facilitators, depending on availability. Facilitators were recruited from departmental meetings and word-of-mouth. The faculty facilitators introduced the policy topic for discussion, guided the discussion, asking for clarification of students’ comments as needed, ensured that all interprofessional team members were respectful, equal contributors, and guided the team if the team was led astray. All faculty facilitators attended an annual faculty development session outlining their roles in an active-learning interprofessional classroom, requiring their roles to be facilitating by guiding and contributing, rather than teaching and directing.

Each session was an active-learning session. The policy components were introduced via the Blackboard® online course portal. For prework, learners were provided with background information and references on a health policy topic two weeks before each session. They were asked open-ended questions to, 1. Respond in writing, for credit, how the policies would change their practices and the geriatric population’s current state of care, 2. Share their perspective in their facilitated IP teams during the sessions, and 3. Apply their knowledge to make policy recommendations. Each learner was expected to come to the live course after having completed the online preparatory work.

Examples of health policy topics were

1. “Write on the advantages and disadvantages of the ‘Pay for performance for geriatric providers’ policy, and consider if you support this strategy (Institute of Medicine, 2014). Think about how this may impact the end-of-life care. If you support this strategy, discuss how it should be implemented. If you support another strategy, discuss how it should be implemented.”

2. “Do you think Congress should become more involved in tracking patient safety? If so, how? Do you think that publishing statistics on evaluation data from US hospitals would result in hospitals becoming safer places? Why or why not? What policies might be in place to ensure uniform and complete data reporting so that evaluations through benchmarking would be most accurate?”

3. “Review two Medicare demonstration projects. Discuss how a team based interprofessional model was foundational for this project. Discuss the intersection of geriatric and palliative care observed from the ‘Optimistic’ experience (Unroe et al., 2015). Describe how you might apply principles learned from these resources on a team based, interprofessional, geriatric and palliative care to your practice. Propose a health care policy that you would offer to legislators from knowledge gained from this assignment.”

4. “Review the resources and the Kansas Fall Prevention Coalition, and make additional recommendations on how health professionals can support falls prevention in Kansas and the US. (Kansas Fall Prevention Coalition, 2020) Determine to whom or to what agency you would address your recommendations and write recommendations to them, from you as a health professional.”

The rich geriatric policy reflections were facilitated by the intentional placement of interprofessional learners into round table groups, each facilitated by a faculty member. This IPE program allowed faculty facilitators from different health professions to select a discussion strategy of their choice for their group, as no specific strategy was required by the program director. The facilitated discussions could become a narrative discourse as learners were able to share, from previous encounters and expectations, their ideas for initiating contact with and inviting a dialog with an older adult to form the basis and continuation of a therapeutic interaction. Learners could socially construct an approach to providing geriatric care around policy topics and make recommendations to the larger group. These discourses differed among round table learner groups, depending on the interaction among facilitator and learners. Each group presented to the larger group their approach and conclusions for each policy issue along with recommendations offered. The qualitative capturing of the depth of discourse became critical to learners’ understanding of their group outcomes. This narrative qualitative inquiry can be characterized as an amalgam of interdisciplinary analytic lenses, diverse disciplinary approaches, and both traditional and innovative methods (Denzin & Lincoln, 2005), The IPE platform offered a distinct opportunity for interprofessional learners to learn from, with and about geriatric health policy and population health. Perhaps a collateral benefit was to support a positive attitude with empathy for an older population among health profession students as burgeoning health professionals. The coauthors reviewed the submitted responses using thematic analysis, provided feedback, and divided policymakers’ recommendations into six areas of emphasis (Vaismoradi, Jones, Hannele, & Snelgrove, 2016).

Evaluation\outcome

The health policy curriculum impacted 487 learners for 12 sessions over three years. Quantitative and qualitative program evaluation surveys were collected assessing each student’s perception of the year’s content and its relevance to their professional practice, 467/487 (96%) responses were received. Surveys were distributed electronically at the end of each year, they were optional but had a point value for their team when completed. Quantitative outcomes were as follows:

Table

On a scale from one to five, one being the worst and five being the best:	Result (SD)
How beneficial were this year’s sessions for your future practice?	3.83 (0.97)
My skills in communicating with other healthcare professionals were improved through learning with students from other health and social care professions	3.8 (0.88)
Learning with students from other health and social care professions is likely to facilitate subsequent working professional relationships	4.25 (0.80)
Learning with students from other health and social care professions is likely to help to overcome stereotypes that are held about the different professions	4.19 (0.71)

Qualitatively, the following question was asked, “How would you use this session in your future practice?” Responses typically matched the profession of the learner; however, four overall themes arose:

1. Policy education: understanding Medicare and seeing their website, awareness of useful geriatric resource websites, such as fall risk websites and coalitions, helping patients understand their Medicare/Medicaid benefits with the help of a social worker, understanding cost of drugs and if drugs meet the patient’s goals, having future access to these sites will help me in practice, learning about the Affordable Care Act will inform me when speaking with patients and family members, understanding Medicare Part D and the donut hole,

2. Interprofessional appreciation: A framework to work interprofessionally, thinking of other professions to help (like physical therapy) before referring older patients to surgery, feeling comfortable consulting others when needing help, seeing how other professions approach the same problems in different ways, incorporating interprofessional colleagues whenever able, occupational therapy appreciating policy efforts and how other professions can help, and students retrospectively valuing communicating with other professions using these tools.

3. Patient care pearls: Developing a comprehensive plan for older patients, look for warning signs for abuse, medication problems, alcohol and substance use, assessing fall risk and resources to help, understand that the patient care team includes the patient, and ensure our team discusses quality of life.

4. Medication understanding: How medications and their adverse effects can impact an older adult’s functional daily life, thinking of polypharmacy guidelines before prescribing in this population, knowing when medications are inappropriate, getting a good prescription and over-the-counter medication history, and using the Beers Criteria (American Geriatrics Society, 2019).

In addition to the outcomes above, written feedback on course value and policy recommendations in practice were given by 166/308 (54%) of the year one cohort, 309/493 (63%) of the year two cohort, and 403/543 (74%) of the year 3 cohort after each session ended.

Interprofessional learners made several recommendations for health policymakers. They included thoughts and educated letters about each of the eight modules covered in the course. Responses differed with most learners emphasizing how geriatric policy would affect their particular profession.

Pay for performance system

Learners expressed consistent concerns regarding the appropriateness of a pay-for-performance payment system for providers and they based this in part on the lack of practical tools for measuring performance. They commented that quality standards for older adults who require complex care as promoted by the American Geriatrics Society may not be included in a pay for performance system. After reflecting that an emphasis on wellness may not be represented in a pay-for-performance system that is disease focused; some concluded that health status and disease status should be incorporated into any evaluation of performance. Lastly, some stated that there may be limited evidence of palliative care’s efficacy or that it would need to be better defined and accepted as efficacious care to be represented in a pay-for-performance system.

Hospital patient safety

Learners overwhelmingly supported the intervention of Congress in promoting patient safety and generally agreed that Congress could play a role in supporting and promoting CDC efforts (Thistlethwaite, 2012). They stated that the CDC initiative could serve as a platform for evaluating patient safety, and there should be a set of national safety standards for reporting incidents. Organizational reporting should be evaluated for incomplete and incorrect data submission; there should be a national evaluation policy for evaluating each organization that should result in rewards and penalties dependent on outcomes. Lastly, there should be publication of safety statistics for each hospital open to the public.

Transitions of care

The Optimistic Demonstration Project was useful for demonstrating the advantages of comprehensive education and communication among the interprofessional team members and between the interprofessional team members and patients and family members (Unroe et al., 2015). Patients should be informed and educated sufficiently to empower them to become contributing members of the team planning their care. Common threads among interprofessional team members should be emphasized; there should be a single vision for care driven by patient-centered, interprofessional, holistic, and humane care. If a national model such as the Optimistic should be implemented, it should include rewards for success as well as penalties for failures.

Ambulatory care (falls)

Learners emphasized the importance of a national focus on improved and consistent physical activity for older adults. They stated that the National Center on Aging (NCOA) campaign and CDC guidance for falls prevention should become national models; states could support funding for free admission to community centers for fitness and wellness programs for seniors that would include transportation with a goal toward maintaining independence, with overall cost-savings when compared to the current expense of falls-related care (National Council on Aging, 2018). The NCOA campaign should be promoted widely to older adults, the general public, and those involved in health care as a resource readily available on their website. Communities should insist on safety precautions in public places that include lighting, non-slip flooring, and safety grab bars. Clinicians should routinely include home and environmental safety in history-taking or assessments. Health professionals should incorporate fall risk as having the same priority in assessments as a-b-c and vital signs; pharmacists should become more involved in screening for drug dosing, drug side effects, and drug–drug interactions concerning falls. Lastly, they recommended that the CDC should provide more oversight for over-the-counter products.

Cognitive, affective, and behavioral health

Learners were mostly inexperienced with programs of care for older adults, especially in ambulatory settings. Some reported from experiences in hospital-based care that they were somewhat acquainted with such as post-operative delusions and antipsychotic use in hospitals to control behaviors, while others recalled one-to-one staff assignments to patients, especially in the case of potential elopements. From senior living facilities, some had become aware of the high use of antidepressants and mood stabilizers and occasionally antipsychotic medications that were used “as a last resort.” Of interest were aspects that they brought to the discussion not only based on their observed experiences, but also from the perspective of the other interprofessional learners. A few were familiar with cognitive behavioral therapy. The psychology learners noted that although the other learners did not express concepts such as cognitive reframing or behavioral activation, they did relate its emphasis on thinking patterns more than behaviors, addressing negativity and linking certain situations, activities and people with positive moods noted in the older adult. All had some experience with the screening instruments for depression and cognitive assessment and their role in identifying problems in a primary care environment, treatment or referral to specialists.

From a health policy perspective, all agreed that they would be interested in prescribing or recommending holistic activities such as yoga, Tai Chi or cognitive behavioral therapy in the ambulatory setting, before medication initiation. Also, they recommended that more community education was needed to assist in public understanding of depression and anxiety in older adults and that medications were not the first-line therapy. While they had observed dementia in various stages, it was determined that it was not within the scope of this agenda for discussion.

Medication management

Learners universally expressed concerns for medication management. They were aware of polypharmacy in older adults and the high risk of taking medications inappropriately due to the number of drugs, their difficult names, sizes, and shapes. In addition, they shared insight about choking risks, allergic reactions, and drug–drug or drug–food interactions. Health policy ideas expressed included options for medication education onsite at the primary care setting, community center, or other site frequented by older adults; medication education for both older adults and their family members or caregivers at sites accessible to all; and providers conducting a medication review prior to prescribing another medication. All expressed the need for clinicians to go into older adult’s homes, increase programs like the VA home-based primary care program, home health care, or other similar programs. They expressed these visits’ goals to review medications and observe stores of medication, both current and past, to work toward having only current medications in their homes. They were aware of community programs that allowed drugs no longer needed to be taken to a site for destruction but asked each other if older adults would or could take advantage of such programs.

Palliative and end of life care

All learners addressed palliative and end of life care and discussed their observations of futile care. Our discussion was based on the Institute of Medicine publication on dying in America, which defined palliative care as “care that provides relief from pain and other symptoms, supports quality of life, and is focused on patients with serious advanced illness and their families.”Competencies, 21 Learners were very accepting of the concept of palliative care from their observed experiences with palliative care and hospice, some remarking that they would choose that for themselves or family members. They noted the prolonged suffering of patients and family members, the weariness of the situation for all but did agree that there is a need to educate providers as well as older adults and family members on the way of explaining and discussing in a positive light. They agreed that during the years of their studies, they had seen both a health care system and a societal change in the level of acceptance of palliative care and end of life care with palliative care beginning some time before death and preventing medication and treatments that could be of little use and often quite costly. They supported the trend toward educated, informed choices and decisions for those for whom curative care was not possible. They did not believe that health care, especially palliative care, should be as highly politicized as they had observed via the media.

Chronic illnesses in older adults

This was a challenging situation for providers and older adults, as they are usually unsure of which of their chronic conditions was causing the problems they were experiencing. Learners reported practical ideas such as all providers being able to share the same records. They noted that sometimes it is the treatment for one problem that results in a condition that is consequently treated as a primary condition by another provider. They commented that some drugs necessary for a condition have side effects present as the primary illness improves. All agreed that quality nutrition, adequate hydration, exercise and sleep were instrumental for any older adult with multiple conditions. These assumptions brought them to the problems older adults have with the knowledge of each requirement, affordability, transportation, and support. There was much discussion on access and barriers for older adults that learners remedied by increasing older adult-oriented public transportation. Without this access, seniors will lose their connection to their community and social networks.

Discussion

This study adds to the current literature by providing a venue for incorporating health policy into an established course. Specifically, embedding geriatric health policy into a 24-month geriatrics TBL course was a good fit. Increasingly, higher education programs are expressing the inclusion of creating social change through application, advocacy, collaboration, and political engagement (Yob, 2018). It is important that health profession educators assist students to understand the value of care provided to the older population (Øster, Munk, & Henriksen, 2019; Pacala, 2014). Geriatric care is specialized adult care and requires knowledge of the uniqueness of adults at advancing age who are affected not only by aging body system but the influence of social determinants of health that affect their daily lives. Communication and cooperation that support mutual understanding of the need for care affect health care performance of providers and adherence to agreed-upon regimens, hence, influencing outcomes of care. These concepts become highly important in the practice of geriatrics.

Prior to the policy group discussions, it was important for the students to become prepared for working interprofessionally with a geriatric population. They needed to understand how to interact with older adults, and discuss factors that differentiated older adults from other adult groups. They also needed to work as interprofessional teams for geriatric health and wellness, disease processes, and formulating treatment plans. The GCP course gave them that foundation on which to build the geriatric policy component.

The GCP was a unique, novel platform to allow health profession students to discuss health system challenges faced by older adults and share geriatric health policy strategies pertinent to their profession. This strategy incorporated social determinants of health afflicting the geriatric population, with the ultimate goals of improving the health of current and future older adults and empowering the next generation of health professionals. This qualitative approach of integrating health policy into the study of geriatrics for emerging health professionals offers opportunities to understand how health professionals, as both providers and stakeholders, may influence practices aimed at establishing a health care and social infrastructure to foster improved health and well-being for older adults that includes informing policy that is relevant to healthy communities. It also gives current policymakers and health practitioners a glimpse of our future policymakers’ thoughts.

Older adults as a population include both healthy and frail aging individuals. The risk for, and frequency of, physiological complexities and functional and cognitive impairments, often co-exist with social determinants of health challenges, such as socioeconomic risks and poor access to primary health care, defining them as a vulnerable population (American Academy of Nursing, 2010; Carger & Westen, 2010). The World Health Organization reports that this population will increase to greater than 1.5 billion by 2050 (National Institute on Aging, 2015). Whether the learners join a geriatrics practice or have geriatric patients within a comprehensive practice, the health policy component presented opportunities for learners to define, describe, discuss and recommend population health, evidence-based practice for older adults as a vulnerable population. Upon review of the written responses by the learners, six common themes included community service concerns, home-based primary care outreach, health promotion advocacy, case management needs, high expense of medications, and commitment to older adults as a vulnerable population.

Learners, as a result of their thoughtful and reflective thinking, exposed weaknesses in current geriatric health policy. Through their reading, response writing, group discourses, and presentations, they expressed previously unrealized concerns of the effect of health policy on the older adults who would soon become members of their patient panels. Some reported that they had written letters to their state legislators, others voiced meeting legislators on the importance of health professionals as members of influential geriatric policy committees. Through their individual and group learning, they became advocates for the older adult population. Through their understanding of the effects of social determinants of health on the livelihood of older adults, they expressed understanding of the essential role that social determinants of health must play in policy development and implementation. Our hope is that we inspired future informed healthcare leaders to advocate interprofessionally for older adults in local, state, and national policies, and ensure that health policies are meaningful and effective for older adults.

Limitations of the study included 1) limitations of representative faculty to be present for initial planning due to availability; 2) variance in participation and distribution of learners based on the “extra-curricular” nature of the program. Every effort was made to have equal distribution of professions; however, attendance variances may have skewed some professions’ presence on some dates; 3) selection bias of health policy topics based on the two faculty from the health policy component being from medicine and nursing, however care was made to include content that would be interprofessional; 4) the exploratory and qualitative nature of the program, necessarily lacking a control group, limiting generalizability; and 5) lack of institutional support for sustainability of the geriatrics course and the embedded policy component.

Conclusion

It is important to both educate health profession learners and provide an educated workforce for the health professions. Leadership, political activism, social determinants and service, are necessary elements of interprofessional programs. The Geriatrics Champions Program Health Policy domain was an effective way to challenge seven health professions’ learners to research and discuss health policy decisions and their impact on older adult patient populations and practices.

Logistically, since the course was already in place, scheduling the timing of the course sessions for the seven professions was not a challenge. Their individual and group narratives demonstrated knowledge of issues and evidenced critical thinking and analysis of health policy and its impact on population health and professional practice. Their research on health policy implications raised awareness of the importance of health professionals as advocates to inform legislation that would inform clinically relevant health policy. Their ideas give the current workforce and policymakers pause about our goals and where our upcoming workforce priorities are. Future thoughts would be to require all learners from all professions to attend and having a sustainable model with leadership buy-in to ensure long-term viability. Incorporating interprofessional health policy to academic curricula is essential for engaged health professionals to improve population health moving forward.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Health Resources and Services Administration [10-228, K01HP20492].