Dr Alison Machin: Director of Inter-professional EducationSue Spencer: Senior lecturerSchool of Health Community and Education Studies

April 07 – Successful bid for funding to be a phase 2 implementation site in an initiative led by the NHS Institute for Innovation and Improvement (NHSI)

Project partners with Northumbria University include: CETL4HealthNE, Newcastle University, North East SHA, North Tyneside PCT and Phase 1 project partner, York St John University

Aim of the NHSI initiative was to embed “service improvement learning” in mainstream professional education programmes and learn from the process of doing so.

Phase 2 had a particular focus on “patient safety”.

Curriculum should include 4 equally important, interconnected parts of improvement

Process and systems thinking

Making it a habit: initiating,

delivering, sustaining and

spreading

Involving users, carers, staff and the

public

Personal and organisational development

Penny 2003

Service user and carer perspective Inter-professional learning (IPL), to

improve collaborative service provision, is a core philosophy of HCES. IPL enables the collaborative exploration of the process of systems improvement

Facility to embed the specific service improvement learning into an existing IPL module and give pre registration students the opportunity to practice service improvement skills

Infrastructure already in place to facilitate this type of initiative

“two or more students from different professional groups learning interactively with, from and about each other in order to promote collaborative working for an improved service user experience” (CAIPE 2009)

“an incident or lived experience arising during contact with health,  social care and  education  services which causes distress or harm (physical, emotional, psychological) to service users and their families” (Machin, Jones and Dawson, 2007).

Core day – delivered to 420 students from 6 professional groups in semester 1 - focus on the basics of SI learning theory

Following this day, a practice related SI project was undertaken by each student – health, social care and education settings

Project was expected to demonstrate the use of a service improvement tool e.g. Plan Do Study Act (PDSA)

IPL seminar to gain formative peer and academic feedback on progression of the project

Project was presented and shared in a supportive IPL context and assessed (80%)

Service users & carers, practice partners and academic staff involved in the assessment to provide additional formative feedback

Students undertake short written reflection on their experience of the process including the assessment presentation(max 500 words)(20%)

Student Staff IT Solutions

Pre-delivery

•Identifying names•Communication•ELP

•Availability•Communication•Engagement

Database

•Admin support essential•Link with Academic Leads•Link with programme managers

Core day •Accommodation•Allocation of groups and subgroups•Equity of experience

•Availability•Preparation•Familiarity with concepts

Web linksDatabase

•Planning•Meetings and feedback loop•Liaise with IT support

Project sharing day

•Accommodation•Timing•Supporting service users•Refreshments + breaks

•Support in assessment requirements•Moderation•Breaks

IT functionMarks recording

•Liaise with IT support•Timetable breaks in assessment schedule•Moderation team

Post assessment

•Follow up marks•Moderation•Feedback•Evaluation•Resubmissions etc

•Follow up marks•Moderation•Feedback•External

MEB •Moderation meeting + feedback•Link with admin teams for marks recording & MEB

What factors in your own work area would support/ hinder large scale cross programme collaborative activity?

Interesting, enjoyable, rewarding experience

Impressed by students’ fresh ideas/enthusiasm

Keen to work with the School again Difficult for people with learning

disabilities to be involved but enjoyed being part of the process

Comments on presentation skills, disability knowledge and dress code

Some room for improvement relating to transport, parking, toilets, furniture and length of sessions

Further development of collaborative working ethos

Engagement in national improvement network Opportunity to share with stakeholders our

commitment to teaching/ facilitating improvement

Further workforce development funding secured to transpose model to local PCT workforce

New learning re involving service users in assessment

Re energised existing L&T activity “Assessment for learning” opportunity

maximised

Out of 272 students who responded:

97% thought service improvement skills were important to their professional role

74% thought that participating in this module and in service improvement learning would enhance their job prospects

91% of students would recommend service improvement learning to other students