Defining and classifying co-curricular interprofessional education in the health professions: a scoping review protocol

Abstract

Objective: This scoping review will identify, characterize, and classify co-curricular interprofessional education activities and practices. Introduction: According to the World Health Organization, interprofessional education occurs when students from two or more professions learn about, from, and with one another to enable effective collaboration and improve health outcomes. As such, interprofessional education is imperative to health professions education. Globally, competency frameworks and guidelines have urged educators to reach consensus about interprofessional education terminology and to integrate this form of education into formal curricula. Voluntary interprofessional education that takes place outside formal curricula (ie, co-curricular) is frequently used to overcome well-documented barriers (eg, discordant academic calendars). We will explore the global literature to identify, characterize, and classify published examples of co-curricular interprofessional education activities. Inclusion criteria: This review will consider voluntary interprofessional education involving students from at least two different health professions. These education activities will take place outside the formal curriculum and will not result in transcript designation. Methods: The search strategy will aim to locate primary studies from peer-reviewed journals indexed in MEDLINE, CINAHL, Scopus, ERIC, and Academic Search Complete. The results will be limited to English-language publications from 2009 until the present. Two independent reviewers will screen titles and abstracts, and potentially relevant papers will be assessed in detail. Data will be extracted using a tool developed by the reviewers. Descriptive statistics will be used to characterize the data, which will be presented in diagrammatic, tabular, or other relevant formats.

A Local Case Competition Expands Meaningful Opportunities for Experiential Interprofessional Learning

“…Co-curricular IPE activities, like interprofessional case competitions, can translate into concrete reflective observations and active experimentations (Kolb et al, 1984) that augment participants' clinical skills by addressing healthcare issues of importance (Recto et al, 2022). The LINC Interprofessional Case Competition was designed to bridge the gap between theoretical classroombased IPE and experiential learning that happens outside formal or required curricula (Farokhi et al, 2022) to strengthen interprofessional skills and empower students to develop realistic team-based solutions to pressing issues in healthcare, including the social determinants of health (Comeau et al, 2019;Stetten et al, 2019).…”