Overcoming Barriers in Nurse-Pharmacist Collaborations on Wards – Qualitative Expert Interviews with Nurses and Pharmacists

Abstract

Purpose

Interprofessional collaboration in healthcare is an essential element in promoting patient safety. However, little research is available on the collaboration between nurses and pharmacists. To optimize processes, mutual understanding is needed, which can be gained by examining the perspectives of those collaborating professional groups. We aimed to identify barriers to the interprofessional collaboration of nurses and pharmacists as well as preconditions and solution strategies to devise approaches for optimizing teamwork in inpatient settings.

Methods

We recruited pairs of collaborating nurses and pharmacists from different hospitals in German-speaking countries and conducted qualitative expert interviews by phone with each of them individually. Transcribed interviews were assessed using qualitative content analysis.

Results

We conducted 12 interviews each with the collaborating nurses and pharmacists. The most frequently mentioned barriers to optimal collaboration were “skepticism due to perception as controller” (reported mainly by pharmacists), “organizational implementation”, and “limited (possibilities of) presence” (reported by both professional groups). A solution strategy proposed to overcome such barriers was “explaining added value”. This added value was found in “clinical-pharmaceutical activities as complement by additional perspective” and “reducing workload in tasks distant from the patient”.

Conclusion

Nurses, pharmacists and hospital management should recognize the added value of intensifying their collaboration regarding patient-related services. A combination of logistical and clinical-pharmaceutical activities should be established at the level of drug application since interviewees endorsed collaboration. A stepwise process must be anticipated to address existing barriers, including some redefinition of professional roles.

Keywords:

• interprofessional collaboration
• interprofessional health teams
• pharmacist
• nurses
• qualitative research

Acknowledgments

We thank all participating nurses and pharmacists for contributing to the study, for taking the time for the interviews, and for the valuable experiences that were shared. We thank Katharine Worthington for the language editing of the manuscript.

Disclosure

The authors report no conflict of interest in this work.

Additional information

Funding

We acknowledge support from Leipzig University for Open Access Publishing.