title: Interprofessional education in an enrichment programme for prospective health sciences students.
abstract: Effective and meaningful interprofessional education opportunities for prospective health sciences students are important to prepare students for the work environment they will encounter after training. This article briefly describes the Summer Academic Enrichment Program, a programme for students pursuing entry to dentistry, medicine, pharmacy, and physical therapy schools. The programme evaluation includes investigation of the programme's effectiveness to impact attitudes towards interprofessional teams and collaboration. The Attitudes Toward Health Care Teams Scale and the Revised Readiness for Interprofessional Learning Scale were administered at the beginning and the end of the programme. Statistical analysis of pre-assessment subscale scores indicated that pre-pharmacy students reported significantly more positive attitudes towards team value than pre-dental students at the beginning of the programme, with post-assessment results indicating that these differences had been eliminated. Additionally, all students demonstrated significantly more positive attitudes towards interprofessional teams during the post-assessment.
authors.affiliation: a Division for Health Sciences Diversity , Virginia Commonwealth University , Richmond , Virginia , USA.
authors.forename: Erika K
authors.initials: EK
authors.lastname: Dumke
authors.affiliation: b Department of Family Medicine , University of Colorado School of Medicine , Aurora , Colorado , USA.
authors.forename: Lynn
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: VanderWielen
authors.affiliation: c Office of the Vice President for Health Sciences, Virginia Commonwealth University , Richmond , Virginia , USA.
authors.forename: Kevin A
authors.initials: KA
authors.lastname: Harris
authors.affiliation: d Department of Physical Therapy , Virginia Commonwealth University , Richmond , Virginia , USA.
authors.forename: Cheryl D
authors.initials: CD
authors.lastname: Ford-Smith
mesh_terms: D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel; D003299:Cooperative Behavior; D017598:Efficiency, Organizational; D006282:Health Personnel / Q000193:education*; D006801:Humans; D007400:Interprofessional Relations; D024382:Professional Role; D015397:Program Evaluation; D013336:Students, Health Occupations
keywords: Education; evaluation; evaluation research; interprofessional education; teamwork