Institute for Interprofessional Education (IIPE)

Interprofessional education provides students from different disciplines with opportunities to learn about, from and with each other. Interprofessional education prepares students to enter the workforce and collaborate effectively as a member of a health care team. A key step in moving health systems from fragmented operations to optimal efficiency, interprofessional education contributes to improved health care outcomes.

Interprofessional Grand Rounds

Graduate students studying physical therapy, speech language pathology, occupational therapy and more collaborated to assist a fictional patient during Kean's 2019 Interprofessional Grand Rounds program. The event was designed to prepare students to work effectively on healthcare teams after graduation. 

Cultural Influences in Healthcare 

Interprofessional Bootcamp was held May 2021 bringing students and faculty from Nathan Weiss Graduate College healthcare professionals together to explore how culture and social determinants of health affect healthcare and how it influences the course of care from the viewpoint of a variety of disciplines.  

Goals of the boot camp included:

• Understand and practice working with other professionals

• Appreciate cultural influences in health care

• Learn how beliefs affect suggestions for care

• Appreciate how cultures contribute to health care disparities

• Determine how cultures look at health promotion and wellness

Keynote Presentation by Chimene Castor, Ph.D., EdD, RDN, LDN, CHES discussed Cultural influences in Healthcare.  Dr. Castor is an Associate Professor in the Department of Nutritional Sciences, College of Nursing and Allied Health Sciences at Howard University. Dr. Castor has 19-years of experience working as a clinical dietitian for hospitals, rehabilitation, and nursing home centers. She also coordinated the peer-education and prevention training program for young Haitian girls in Aquin, Haiti. Dr. Castor has participated in several health programs in South Africa, Kenya, Jamaica, Haiti, Tobago, Ghana, and Togo. Dr.Castor has co-authored several scientific publications in areas of diabetes, heart disease, and obesity prevention. She is currently conducting research to address nutrition, sleep and diabetes, and diabetes literacy in women in Haiti and other Caribbean countries.

IPE Core Competencies

The Interprofessional Education Collaborative (IPEC) has outlined four core competencies for education in the health professions:

1. Values and Ethics: Work with individuals of other professions to maintain a climate of mutual respect and shared values.
2. Roles and Responsibilities: Use knowledge of your profession and other disciplines to assess and address the health care needs of patients and to promote and advance the health of populations.
3. Interprofessional Communication: Communicate with patients, families, communities and professionals in health and other fields in a responsive and responsible manner that supports a team approach to the promotion and maintenance of health and the prevention and treatment of disease.
4. Teams and Teamwork: Apply relationship-building values and the principles of team dynamics to perform effectively in different team roles. Plan, deliver and evaluate patient and population-centered care. Create health programs and policies that are safe, timely, efficient, effective and equitable.

Co-authored by Kean professors Mahchid Namazi, George P. Holan, Sharon E. McKenzie, Prisca O. Anuforo, Jennifer A. Pax, Laurie Knis-Matthews and Donald R. Marks, "An Exploratory Survey Study of Grand Rounds as an Interprofessional Education Tool for Graduate Students in the Health Professions" explores the benefits of Grand Rounds for IPE and the academic process for developing IPE activities.  The article was published in the April 15, 2019 edition of Perspectives of the ASHA Special Interest Groups.