title: Occupational therapy students in the process of interprofessional collaborative learning: a grounded theory study.
abstract: The purpose of this grounded theory study was to generate a theory of the interprofessional collaborative learning process of occupational therapy (OT) students who were engaged in a collaborative learning experience with students from other allied health disciplines. Data consisted of semi-structured interviews with nine OT students from four different interprofessional collaborative learning experiences at three universities. The emergent theory explained OT students' need to build a culture of mutual respect among disciplines in order to facilitate interprofessional collaborative learning. Occupational therapy students went through a progression of learned skills that included learning how to represent the profession of OT, hold their weight within a team situation, solve problems collaboratively, work as a team, and ultimately, to work in an actual team in practice. This learning process occurred simultaneously as students also learned course content. The students had to contend with barriers and facilitators that influenced their participation and the success of their collaboration. Understanding the interprofessional learning process of OT students will help allied health faculty to design more effective, inclusive interprofessional courses.
authors.affiliation: Department of Occupational Therapy, 103 Dizney Building, Eastern Kentucky University, 521 Lancaster Avenue, Richmond, KY 40475, USA. Dana.howell@eku.edu
authors.forename: Dana
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Howell
mesh_terms: D003299:Cooperative Behavior; D003627:Data Interpretation, Statistical; D006801:Humans; D033183:Interdisciplinary Communication; D007407:Interviews as Topic; D007858:Learning; D009788:Occupational Therapy / Q000193:education*; D010348:Patient Care Team / Q000592:standards; D013334:Students