title: A network model of communication in an interprofessional team of healthcare professionals: A cross-sectional study of a burn unit.
abstract: Healthcare teams consist of individuals communicating with one another during patient care delivery. Coordination of multiple specialties is critical for patients with complex health conditions, and requires interprofessional and intraprofessional communication. We examined a communication network of 71 health professionals in four professional roles: physician, nurse, health management, and support personnel (dietitian, pharmacist, or social worker), or other health professionals (including physical, respiratory, and occupational therapists, and medical students) working in a burn unit. Data for this cross-sectional study were collected by surveying members of a healthcare team. Ties were defined by asking team members whom they discussed patient care matters with on the shift. We built an exponential random graph model to determine: (1) does professional role influence the likelihood of a tie; (2) are ties more likely between team members from different professions compared to between team members from the same profession; and (3) which professions are more likely to form interprofessional ties. Health management and support personnel ties were 94% interprofessional while ties among nurses were 60% interprofessional. Nurses and other health professionals were significantly less likely than physicians to form ties. Nurses were 1.64 times more likely to communicate with nurses than non-nurses (OR = 1.64, 95% CI: 1.01-2.66); there was no significant role homophily for physicians, other health professionals, or health management and support personnel. Understanding communication networks in healthcare teams is an early step in understanding how teams work together to provide care; future work should evaluate the types and quality of interactions between members of interprofessional healthcare teams.
authors.affiliation: a Department of Public Health Sciences, School of Medicine , Loyola University Chicago , Chicago , Illinois , USA.|b Leischner Institute for Medical Education , Loyola University Chicago , Chicago , Illinois , USA.
authors.forename: David A
authors.initials: DA
authors.lastname: Shoham
authors.affiliation: c Brown School , Washington University in St. Louis , St. Louis , Missouri , USA.
authors.forename: Jenine K
authors.initials: JK
authors.lastname: Harris
authors.affiliation: d Department of Family Medicine, School of Medicine and Public Health , University of Wisconsin-Madison , Madison , Wisconsin , USA.
authors.forename: Marlon
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Mundt
authors.affiliation: b Leischner Institute for Medical Education , Loyola University Chicago , Chicago , Illinois , USA.
authors.forename: William
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: McGaghie
mesh_terms: D002053:Burn Units; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D006801:Humans; D033183:Interdisciplinary Communication; D017146:Models, Organizational; D010348:Patient Care Team; D014481:United States
keywords: Burn unit; healthcare team; interprofessional team; network analysis