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Inter-Professional Communication In Health Care

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The concept of inter-professional practice suggests that healthcare which is provided by a team of different professionals is integral for quality health outcomes. Only through discussing the roles and responsibilities of the selected healthcare members and understanding the use of inter-professional communication can effective patient care be achieved.
Inter-professional practice allows for two or more professional practices to work together with mutual respect, common purpose, commitment and most importantly as a united team (Lee & Matthews, 2009). The concept therefore suggests that when professionals from different specialties participate to achieve a common goal, relying on each other to get the best outcome is when inter-professional …show more content…

Communication has been defined by Webster’s Dictionary as “the imparting or interchange of thoughts, opinions, or information by speech, writing, or signs” (O’Daniel & Rosenstein, 2008). All of these communication techniques should be used inter-professionally though healthcare. The collaboration between nurses, doctors and other healthcare professionals increases the awareness of other professions skills and knowledge. This leads to improved communication and decision making when providing patient care. However, this doesn't always happen due to lack of communication between healthcare professionals. Poor communication between health care providers can also lead to delays in diagnosing a patient, patients receiving the wrong treatment, triggering life threatening adverse events as well as an increase in the time of a patient's hospital stay ("Clinical Communication Framework", 2016). Hierarchy is also one of the reasons why there are miscommunications and communication problems in general. Due to doctors and surgeons being at the top of the hierarchy ladder nurses and paramedics fall further down the ‘ladder’. While some professions feel as if communication is open and that any other profession has the right to speak openly to them, other professions feel the opposite. Professions on the ‘lower end’ tend to feel uncomfortable speaking about problems or concerns that need to be addressed as they may feel intimidated by their colleagues (O’Daniel & Rosenstein, 2008). Over time professions have been thinking less about the hierarchy and are overcoming what once was, however, some individuals still believe in the hierarchy ladder complicating communication methods. On the other hand a patient will always feel safer and in better hands with a team of professionals who are open to communication and work cohesively as one

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