Impact of an interprofessional education and care initiative on institutional culture change

Background/Rationale Recent communications on Interprofessional Education and Practice from the Canadian Interprofessional Health Collaborative, the World Health Organization, the American Interprofessional Health Collaborative and the Interprofessional Education Collaborative reinforce the importance of interprofessional education and practice initiatives in today’s health care environment. The recent growth of such initiatives at universities and health care organizations has the potential to facilitate institution-wide culture change. However, organizational change is challenging and requires an examination of the present culture and development of change strategies that involve more than just the support of administration. This discussion will provide a framework to examine organizations and will explore five core change strategies identified by Kezar and Eckel (2002) that include senior administrative support, collaborative leadership, robust design/vision, staff development, and visible actions. Incorporating selected theories adopted for exploring existing higher education cultures, the authors will briefly provide an overview of their journey toward institutional culture change. This will serve as a jumping off point for a conversation about how each of us can use the change strategies to promote sustainable interprofessional education to promote patient-centered, team-based care at our home institutions. Learning Objectives: At the end of the session, participants will be able to: 1. Discuss two selected conceptual frameworks on culture. 2. Examine existing cultural archetypes of home organizations. 3. Propose methods to integrate interprofessional education and practice into home organizations based on Kezar and Eckel’s five core change strategies