A network model of communication in an interprofessional team of healthcare professionals: A cross-sectional study of a burn unit

Abstract

Healthcare teams consist of individuals communicating with one another during patient care delivery. Coordination of multiple specialties is critical for patients with complex health conditions, and requires interprofessional and intraprofessional communication. We examined a communication network of 71 health professionals in four professional roles: physician, nurse, health management, and support personnel (dietitian, pharmacist, or social worker), or other health professionals (including physical, respiratory, and occupational therapists, and medical students) working in a burn unit. Data for this cross-sectional study were collected by surveying members of a healthcare team. Ties were defined by asking team members whom they discussed patient care matters with on the shift. We built an exponential random graph model to determine: (1) does professional role influence the likelihood of a tie; (2) are ties more likely between team members from different professions compared to between team members from the same profession; and (3) which professions are more likely to form interprofessional ties. Health management and support personnel ties were 94% interprofessional while ties among nurses were 60% interprofessional. Nurses and other health professionals were significantly less likely than physicians to form ties. Nurses were 1.64 times more likely to communicate with nurses than non-nurses (OR = 1.64, 95% CI: 1.01-2.66); there was no significant role homophily for physicians, other health professionals, or health management and support personnel. Understanding communication networks in healthcare teams is an early step in understanding how teams work together to provide care; future work should evaluate the types and quality of interactions between members of interprofessional healthcare teams.

Supervisors’ pedagogies for supporting interns to learn intra- and interprofessional collaboration: a qualitative and quantitative ego network analysis

“…With a percentage of 90%, they even computed substantial higher values for interprofessional collaboration compared to our results. The network size of the physicians involved in their study was in line with our results, as a mean of 20 contacts was found (Shoham et al, 2016). Another example is the study of Pomare, Long, Ellis, Churruca, and Braithwaite (2018), in which was shown that the staff of two youth mental health service centers tends to collaborate with colleagues outside of their professional group.…”

“…Findings in more recent literature meet this need and are consistent with our results. For instance, a recent study discovered that physicians in a team of healthcare professionals of a hospital burn unit were involved in a higher percentage of interprofessional than intraprofessional contacts (Shoham, Harris, Mundt, & McGaghie, 2016). With a percentage of 90%, they even computed substantial higher values for interprofessional collaboration compared to our results.…”

Nurses' Perceptions of Personal Communication Devices in the Perioperative Environment

“…13,14 Some studies have shown an inability of some perioperative team members to reflect these attributes consistently. 5,7,15 Multiple studies found communication patterns depend on individual team components, 12,13,16 the perception of psychological safety to raise a concern, 13 and effective structured communication strategies (eg, scripting). 14 Taken together, we found that the published literature shows that perioperative team members require a culture and environment that supports effective and open communication to ensure patient safety.…”

<p>Non-Medical Radiography Staff Experiences in Inter-Professional Communication: A Swedish Qualitative Focus Group Interview Study</p>

“…Knowledge about the development of interaction between inter-professional healthcare staff and how it affects the quality of health outcomes, is considered important in cooperation between teams. 5 Earlier studies of radiologists' experiences of interprofessional communication described difficulties such as insufficient information in the referral forms leading to the wrong radiography examination being performed 4,6 Misunderstandings in both inter-personal and inter-professional clinical communication cause suffering in patients and economic losses in the healthcare system. The same researchers 4,6 also described the decreased face-to face communication with patients due to high technology development.…”