Interprofessional education in healthcare training: an integrated, simulationbased educational experience

Abstract

Interprofessional education equips healthcare students and professionals for effective, patientcentered collaborative practice by optimizing specific knowledge and skills and developing interprofessional competencies. Through practice
and guided reflection, simulation contributes to the development of interprofessional teamwork skills. This project outlines an integrated, simulationbased
interprofessional education initiative within undergraduate healthcare programs and explores students’ learning experiences. The educational approach is grounded in an active methodology that combines highfidelity simulation, retraining clinical assessment activities and interprofessional analysis of a real clinical case. Simulations were designed according to the framework of the Core Competencies for Interprofessional Collaborative
Practice (IPEC), using tools aimed at improving team performance, patient safety, communication skills and a critical awareness of one’s contribution within the team. To explore the learning experience, an exploratory qualitative study of students’ portfolios was conducted following an Artificial Intelligenceassisted approach. A total of 153 written
reports were analyzed, categorizing the data according to the four IPEC domains. Team success was attributed to effective collaborative practice based on interdependence and shared responsibility, oriented toward patientcentered
care. Effective communication emerged as crucial for negotiating synergistic and shared care by integrating common tools, methods, and terminology. Interprofessional simulation was perceived as a valuable educational tool, confirming itself as an effective individual and group learning environment for interprofessional education.