The Development of a Novel Interprofessional Education Curriculum for third year medical and pharmacy students

Abstract Introduction: The Liaison Committee on Medical Education and the Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education, agencies responsible for the accreditation of medical and pharmacy schools respectively, require interprofessional education (IPE) to be integrated into both curricula. Institutions are given the autonomy to design and implement this requirement, however research is equivocal in regards to when and how best to implement IPE. The development of a new IPE curriculum is often met with a number of challenges, such as a lack of faculty support and resources. Methods: This study describes a newly created pilot IPE curriculum developed with minimal existing organizational IPE structure and resources, led by faculty champions from two complementary healthcare professions, Internal Medicine and Pharmacy. The validated 10-item Student Perceptions of Interprofessional Clinical Education- Revised (SPICE-R) instrument was used to assess the medical and pharmacy students’ attitudes towards interprofessional healthcare teams and the team approach to patient care. Results: Overall, students demonstrated a statistically significant increase in their perception of interprofessional healthcare teams and team approach to patient care. Conclusion: Prior to this IPE curriculum no formal IPE curriculum existed in this setting. This IPE curriculum was successfully implemented with minimal existing resources, the use of faculty champions and student’s perception of IPE improved using the validated SPICE-R instrument. IPE curriculum integration at our institution is in various stages of development. As IPE integration moves forward this pilot can serve as one example of how IPE could be implemented