Objectives:

1. To identify the most promising conceptual frameworks, methodological strategies, and outcomes evidence required to design conjoint educational programs for effective interprofessional training in the clinical practice of DS/PtDAs.


2. To compare different models for implementing effective interprofessional clinical training programs in DS/PtDAs, and thereby identify the key principles for establishing a sustainable process for certifying clinicians in the practice of DS/PtDAs.


3. To identify and mentor the next generation of scientists who are prepared to investigate key basic and applied problems in the field of interprofessional education about the clinical practice of DS/DAs.


4. To anticipate emerging trends in the field of interprofessional education about the clinical practice of DS/DAs.

Why This Particular Theme at This Particular Time?

We Have Made Progress with PtDAs:

• The efficacy of good-quality PtDAs as tools to help provide patients with decision support has been established.


• The infrastructure for building/maintaining libraries of effective PtDAs is growing and improving.


• International consensus standards for designing/testing PtDAs have been developed.

We Have Made Progress with Models & Measures:

• Several models for implementing decision support services have been developed.


• Several models for teaching DS/PtDAs as a clinical skill have been developed and implemented.


• We have measures to assess the quality of the decision support process as well as the quality of the choices that patients actually make.

Therefore:

• Now it's timely to develop certification standards ensuring that a given health care provider has successfully completed a training program that credentials -- at both the pre- and post-licensure levels -- his/her professional skill in the DS/PtDAs interventions required for informed patient choice.


• These training initiatives could be adapted for national roll-out.


• This would require capacity-building, by training clinical teachers in DS/PtDAs and by integrating their teaching into the certification processes of faculties of health sciences and into CME activities.


• Then systematic, regular updates would ensure that a provider continues to meet these DS/PtDAs certification standards.

However:

• It may be short-sighted to focus only on discipline-specific training in DS/PtDAs.


• Currently, there is considerable emphasis on patient-centered care, and increasing recognition of the pivotal role that DS (with or without PtDAs) could play in fostering that patient-centered care.


• At the same time, complex patient care requires multidisciplinary health care teams.


• Therefore, in preference-sensitive care situations, there are competing pressures on diverse practitioners who, despite their differing backgrounds and competencies, are attempting simultaneously to foster individualized patient-centered care as well as ensure the continuity and coordination of that care.


• Under these circumstances, it's very difficult for the potential positive contribution of DS/PtDAs to be fully realized.

So, an Interprofessional Education Strategy:

• One strategy for resolving this dilemma is to provide practitioners with the knowledge base and skill set they need to engage in the interprofessional practice of DS/PtDAs. If the different members of multidisciplinary health care teams were well-prepared to work together in providing DS/PtDAs, these conjoint efforts could foster improved coordination and continuity in patient-centered care.


• Accordingly, there is a pressing need to systematically assess and integrate the emerging theories, models, and evaluative strategies for the interprofessional teaching of DS/PtDAs as a clinical skill.


• To do this, we need to build collaborative links between experts in patients' decision support and experts in professional education, in order to develop, test, and implement effective, sustainable interprofessional training programs to teach DS/PtDAs as a clinical skill.