Summary
Lingard (2016) argues that the medical sphere has originally been oriented towards the individualistic competencies of the workers. However, this paradigm is rapidly shifting towards understanding teamwork’s importance in solving complex problems (Lingard et al., 2017). Organizing professionals in one group boosts the active sharing of unique experiences, knowledge, and perception among them, which is known as collective competence. As a result, such teams are able to provide better and more holistic care to patients (Langlois, 2020).
In addition, it is important to notice that group qualification is not merely the sum of individual expertise (Ranganathan, 2017). Each formed team can be considered a separate organism that functions according to different rules than a single person or group of strangers. Therefore, assembling highly professional physicians would not always guarantee favorable outcomes; rather, it may even lead to failure (Lingard, 2016). For that reason, educators and managers nowadays are required to enhance special abilities necessary for students’ future and employees’ current successful work in teams.
Improvement Goals
Firstly, I will commit myself to the sub-competency VE6 and always be competent enough in my sphere of expertise (Interprofessional Education Collaborative, 2016, p. 11). I think that such a view should be at the center of any individual and collective work, especially when it concerns the well-being of others. Each specialist should be aware of one’s responsibility before the group and seek to provide the best level of care to the patient.
Secondly, I will commit to sub-competency RR1 as it is vital to “communicate one’s roles and responsibilities clearly to patients, families, community members, and other professionals”(Interprofessional Education Collaborative, 2016, p. 12). In my opinion, any interaction and collaboration with people that assume the existence of rights and duties of the sides should be clear for all the participants. That will help to communicate to others what should be expected from you and make it evident to oneself. I believe that such an approach would significantly reduce misunderstanding and, thus, the frequency of conflict between people.
The Marriage of Acute Care and Community Care
- The current webinar included the interviewer’s discussion with two-sphere experts concerning the management strategies that were implied after the COVID-19 outbreak, with special emphasis on collaboration between various stakeholders. Both interviewees noted that the crisis could be effectively administered mainly due to collaboration between different parties.
- The barriers to successful collaboration that experts encountered were related to communication (fast and effective response) and operational (patient transfer) difficulties.
- In order to address the spread of the COVID-19 virus and the consequent danger to each member of the community, the neighbors from my area decided to unite the efforts at the beginning of the pandemic. The problem that should have been addressed included providing security masks and necessary products to older adults. The neighbors raised funds with the purpose that any member who would find N95 masks selling in the store would be able to purchase them for all the people at once. Moreover, older people could communicate their needs for the food and other products (through the WhatsApp group), and other neighbors would go to the stores to make purchases.
Due to the fact that the collaboration did not necessitate any professional knowledge, neither interprofessional (when experts from one sphere unite) nor interdisciplinary (when experts from various spheres unite) collaboration existed (Barthel & Seidl, 2017). Probably, for that reason, no barriers were identified as the problem to be solved was not too sophisticated.
References
Barthel, R., & Seidl, R. (2017). Interdisciplinary collaboration between natural and social sciences–status and trends exemplified in groundwater research. PLoS One, 12(1). Web.
Interprofessional Education Collaborative. (2016). Core competencies for interprofessional collaborative practice: 2016 update. Web.
Langlois, S. (2020). Collective competence: Moving from individual to collaborative expertise. Perspectives on medical education, 9(2), 71-73.
Lingard, L., Sue-Chue-Lam, C., Tait, G. R., Bates, J., Shadd, J., & Schulz, V. (2017). Pulling together and pulling apart: influences of convergence and divergence on distributed healthcare teams. Advances in Health Sciences Education, 22(5), 1085-1099.
Lingard, L. (2016). Paradoxical truths and persistent myths: reframing the team competence conversation. Journal of Continuing Education in the Health Professions, 36, S19-S21.
Ranganathan, B. (2017). Collaboration at scale – can the whole be greater than the sum of its parts? LinkedIn. Web.