Interprofessional collaborative patient-centred care: a critical exploration of two related discourses

Abstract

There has been sustained international interest from health care policy makers, practitioners, and researchers in developing interprofessional approaches to delivering patient-centred care. In this paper, we offer a critical exploration of a selection of professional discourses related to these practice paradigms, including interprofessional collaboration, patient-centred care, and the combination of the two. We argue that for some groups of patients, inequalities between different health and social care professions and between professionals and patients challenge the successful realization of the positive aims associated with these discourses. Specifically, we argue that interprofessional and professional–patient hierarchies raise a number of key questions about the nature of professions, their relationships with one another as well as their relationship with patients. We explore how the focus on interprofessional collaboration and patient-centred care have the potential to reinforce a patient compliance model by shifting responsibility to patients to do the “right thing” and by extending the reach of medical power across other groups of professionals. Our goal is to stimulate debate that leads to enhanced practice opportunities for health professionals and improved care for patients.

• Interprofessional collaboration
• patient-centred practice
• professional practice

Declaration of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest. The authors are responsible for the writing and content of this paper.

Notes

¹ We have employed the term “patient centred care” in this paper as it is arguably the most common term in the literature. Its use in this paper also covers other similar initiatives such as “shared decision-making”, “patient partnership”, and “relationship centred care” which while aiming to increase involvement of patients in the organization and delivery of their care, contain the same issues (e.g. inherent inequalities between providers of care and the recipients).