Improving the Interdisciplinary Clinical Education of a Palliative Care Program through Quality Improvement Initiatives.

Palliative care relies on a team approach to manage the complex needs of patients and families living with serious illness. This article describes an interprofessional team's aim to develop an interactive online curriculum in palliative care, with an emphasis on interprofessional education (IPE). The aim of the program is to address the need for formalized interprofessional palliative care education. The interdisciplinary team identified the need for formalized education efforts within our clinical space. To address the need, the team designed an online curriculum based in the core competencies of palliative care and IPE. A new model was established, with the themes of learning about "people," learning the "job," and learning "respect." The team followed the plan-do-study-act model to guide their process. The newly developed interprofessional online curriculum was utilized by palliative care trainees from various disciplines and levels of education. Pre- and post-tests to measure the knowledge, behavior, attitudes, and skills needed for teamwork and core palliative care competencies were completed. Forty-three medical and nursing students, undergraduate and graduate, completed the pretest, and 32 students completed the post-test. Results indicate that learners are growing in interprofessional skills and attitudes, but not in formalized knowledge of palliative care as a result of their clinical experience. Results suggest that more formalized knowledge may need to be provided to learners who come to this clinical experience, which could be delivered through the online curriculum. The knowledge survey should also be re-evaluated for clarity and content.

Evaluation Tools for Interdisciplinary Palliative Care Learning Experiences: A Literature Review.

Background: An interdisciplinary palliative care team began exploring evaluation tools used to assess changes in the knowledge, skills, and attitudes of learners participating in clinical learning experiences on an interdisciplinary palliative care consult service. This article will review existing evaluation tools, examine the themes that emerge, discuss their strengths and limitations, and make recommendations for continued development in the field. Methods and Findings: A literature search was performed using the MEDLINE database. Search terms included combinations of the following: interdisciplinary education, assessment/evaluation, and palliative care or palliative care assessment/test. Four hundred eighty-seven articles were captured during the initial search. Articles that focused on student readiness for interdisciplinary education and team self-assessments of current interdisciplinary collaboration practices were excluded. Nine articles were included in the review. Evaluation tools varied in terms of learner type, assessment type, and frequency. No tool was comprehensive in the assessment of knowledge, skills, and attitudes or truly interdisciplinary. Conclusions: There is a lack of comprehensive and interdisciplinary evaluation tools in the published literature. Further research should be conducted to develop a tool that meets the needs of learners in clinical experiences within an interdisciplinary service.