Overcoming barriers to interprofessional education in gerontology: the Interprofessional Curriculum for the Care of Older Adults

Abstract

A fragmented workforce consisting of multiple disciplines with varying levels of training and limited ability to work as a team often provides care to older adults. Interprofessional education (IPE) is essential for preparing practitioners for the effective teamwork required for community-based, holistic, person-centered care of the older adults. Despite numerous programs and offerings to advance education and interdisciplinary patient care, there is an unmet need for geriatric IPE, especially as it relates to community-dwelling older adults and caregivers in medically underserved areas. A core group of university faculty from multiple disciplines received funding from the Health Resources and Services Administration Geriatric Workforce Enhancement Program to collaborate with community-based providers from several Area Agencies on Aging in the creation and implementation of the Interprofessional Curriculum for the Care of Older Adults (iCCOA). This geriatric curriculum is interprofessional, comprehensive, and community-based. Learners include third-year nursing students, nurse practitioner students, third-year medical students, internal medicine and family medicine residents, master’s level social work students, third-year pharmacy students, pharmacy residents, third-year dental students, dental hygiene students, community-based organization professionals, practicing community organizers, and community health navigators. This article describes the efforts, successes, and challenges experienced with this endeavor, including securing funding, ensuring equal representation of the disciplines, adding new components to already crowded curricula, building curriculum on best practices, improving faculty expertise in IPE, managing logistics, and ensuring comprehensive evaluation. The results summarize the iCCOA components, as well as the interprofessional domains, knowledge, and competencies.

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Keywords:

• interdisciplinary education
• geriatrics
• team-based care
• community-based care
• curriculum

Acknowledgments

This project is supported by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) of the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) under U1QHP28732 titled Kentucky Rural & Underserved Geriatric Interprofessional Education Program and is a 3-year grant of $2.55 million. This information or content and conclusions are those of the authors and should not be construed as the official position or policy of, nor should any endorsements be inferred by, the HRSA, HHS, or the US Government. This material is based on the work supported by HRSA, which had no role in the design, methods, participant recruitment, data collection, analysis, or preparation of the manuscript or in decision to submit manuscript for publication. Aspects of this paper were presented as conference talks at the Association for Gerontology in Higher Education annual meeting in March 2017, the American Society on Aging annual conference in March 2017, and the American Geriatrics Society annual meeting in May 2017. No abstracts were published.

Author contributions

Schapmire, Head, and Faul AC conceived the model concept and design. Yankeelov had access to and analyzed the data, and took responsibility for the integrity. Schapmire and Head prepared the manuscript. All authors contributed toward data analysis, drafting and revising the paper and agree to be accountable for all aspects of the work.

Disclosure

The authors report no conflicts of interest in this work.