IPR.Global Scholar Spotlight - Dr. Gayle Halas, University of Manitoba (Canada)

Hello! My name is Gayle Halas, RDH, MA, PhD. and I am the the inaugural Rady Chair in Interprofessional Collaborative Practice at the University of Manitoba (Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada).  This locally supported research chair focuses on interprofessional collaborative practice research and scholarship; provides leadership in training, educating, and mentoring future leaders in interprofessional collaborative practice; and builds upon collaborative relationships between educational and practice systems.  

My current research is focused on team-based primary health care, and the communication and interactions that enable collaborative practice, particularly for addressing complex needs and care. Focusing on complex needs has resulted in collaborations with teams examining the older adult care continuum, team approaches for addressing substance use disorders, and transitions in care that are informed by stakeholder experiences and perspectives. My current work is exploring virtual visits in primary care, practice-level factors influencing interprofessional teamwork, and patient/public/caregiver experiences of team-based care. I have also been working with a team developing an interprofessional student-infused community health centre, targeting community needs for chronic disease and experiential learning for interprofessional practice building. 

I am also a provincial research lead in a pan-Canadian primary and integrated health care research network, launched in 2014 by the Canadian Institutes for Health Research. This alliance of researchers, policy makers, clinicians and patient/public members aims to create evidence that can inform learning and practice systems as well be readily implemented for improved health services.  

In 2006, after a clinical career as a dental hygienist, I moved into a research role with the department of family medicine and, with some great mentorship, later appointed director of  research in the department.  I developed (perhaps even inherited!) an appreciation for the expertise of a team in providing patient-centred comprehensive primary care. In many ways, interprofessional practice was an assumption within the research that was conducted and the ways in which care was provided. 

What achievement are you most proud of in the area of interprofessional education and research?

Diverse partnerships. I am currently working with a breadth of key stakeholders, including members of the community with various lived experiences of homelessness, caregiving through to managing one’s own health and basic communication with health care providers.  I value the partnerships I have formed with policy-makers and realize the importance of situating research within the systems of care. I am fortunate to have dedicated researchers with whom I collaborate, from within my own academic institution as well as from other Canadian universities and extending to one international team.

What does IPR.Global mean to you? 

The experts in Interprofessional Education and Practice Research – and a focused community of practice!  The structures and processes supporting interprofessional collaboration are ripe for investigation and there is great potential to collaborate, compare and contrast what is working and why. 

And finally, should pineapple be on pizza? Yes or No?

Absolutely and especially if accompanied by Canadian bacon! 

Interprofessional Research.Global Scholar Spotlight is a regular feature that highlights member research in Interprofessional Education and Collaborative Practice.  

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IPR.Global Scholar Spotlight - Dr. Noreen O'Leary, University of Limerick (Ireland)

Hello and thank you for the chance to meet the IPR.G community. My name is Noreen O’Leary and I am from Ireland. I am a qualified speech and language therapist and have been interested in health professions education since completing my own training. I have a Masters in Clinical Education. My thesis for this programme focused on the issue of identity and the difference between imagined professional identity as a student and reality as a graduate clinician.

I became involved in IPE in 2017, when I started my doctoral programme. My PhD focused on practice-based (placement) IPE for health professions such as speech and language therapy, human nutrition and dietetics, physiotherapy, and occupational therapy. My research has mainly used qualitative methods and I am very interested in the contribution of qualitative research to addressing complex research question. I am also very interested in the role of theory in making sense of complex issues and understand how and why interventions or change do or do not work. 

During the course of my PhD I became aware that there was not a network for educators with an interest in IPE in Ireland. I established an IPE Special Interest Group with a colleague and am currently co-chair of this group which provides networking and professional development opportunities for members. I am also a member of the UK-based Centre for the Advancement of Interprofessional Education. I am a member of the research working group and currently lead a sub-group looking at the impact of IPE on graduate practice. In May 2021 I became a member of the IPR.Global Partnership Development Working Group and am very much enjoying getting to know international colleagues.  IPR.Global offers a great opportunity to develop global networks and projects, drawing on knowledge and skills from all regions. I am excited to be part of IPE as it evolves and grows over the coming years, building on existing foundations and moving in new and innovative directions. 

More information on my research and publications can be found here: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1148-2186 and I am on Twitter @OLeary_Noreen. 

Interprofessional Research.Global Scholar Spotlight is a regular feature that highlights member research in Interprofessional Education and Collaborative Practice.  

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New Article in Journal of Interprofessional Care: "From uniprofessionality to interprofessionality: dual vs dueling identities in healthcare"

Dr. Hossein Khalili and Dr. Sheri L. Price authored a new article  "From uniprofessionality to interprofessionality: dual vs dueling identities in healthcare" in the Journal of Interprofessional Care. The transformation from uniprofessionality to interprofessionality in healthcare requires the application of interprofessional socialization not just at the individual level, but also at the professional and system levels. In this process of interprofessional socialization, we need to embrace the uniqueness of each profession while cultivating an interprofessional collaboration culture in the system (dual identity). In so doing, we can facilitate a shifting mind-set, culture, operations, and policies in healthcare to recognize and foster the contribution and accountability of each profession toward achieving the quadruple aim of better care, better health, better value, and better work experience. Healthcare systems are still viewed as siloed performances of single professions, rather than a collective functioning of interprofessional teams. Current policies, procedures, and regulations in healthcare education and practice seem to contribute to this context in which the various health and social care professions are set in opposition to one another. The historical, and still prominent, uniprofessional education and socialization practices position health and social care professions to view each as rivals and threats toward achieving their profession/al advancement and growth. 

Access article at: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13561820.2021.1928029

Contact Dr. Hossein Khalili, Director, UW Center for Interprofessional Practice and Education (UW CIPE) and President, InterprofessionalResearch.Global (IPR.Global): hkhalili@wisc.edu

IPR.Global Scholar Spotlight - Dr. Kaprea Johnson, Virginia Commonwealth University (USA)

Hello, I am Dr. Kaprea Johnson, and I am a tenured associate professor of Counselor Education at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, VA USA. Within this area I focus on how interprofessional education and collaboration between graduate level mental health and allied health care students can improve patient outcomes. I am currently the Director of the Equity Research Lab, in which collaborative projects focus on equity issues in screening children and transitional aged youth for social inequities (i.e., discrimination, food and housing insecurity, income inequality), school/mental health counselor training needs to address social inequities, and interrogating systems that perpetuate inequities (i.e., education and healthcare systems). 

These innovative lines of research have helped our team of interprofessional collaborators in garnering over $5 million in grants. In addition, I have conducted over 100 presentations/ or trainings, have two books, several non-refereed practitioner focus publications, and 53 peer reviewed publications in national and international journals in counseling, education, and allied health. Additionally, I have a consulting and coaching practice that supports organizations and professionals interested in solutions for justice, diversity, healing, and equity.

Contact Dr. Kaprea Johnson: johnsonkf@vcu.edu

Interprofessional Research.Global Scholar Spotlight is a regular feature that highlights member research in Interprofessional Education and Collaborative Practice.  

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Dr. John Gilbert Named as Acting Interim Director of the UBC Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies

The Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies at the University of British Columbia is pleased to announce that Professor Emeritus John Gilbert (Faculty of Medicine, College of Health Disciplines, School of Audiology & Speech Sciences) has been appointed as the Acting Interim Director of the Institute beginning June 1st, 2021.  

Dr. Gilbert has been a seminal leader in the education of health professionals in British Columbia, Canada and globally. His vision and leadership led to the concept of interprofessional education being developed as a central tenet of collaborative person-centred practice and care.  Dr. Gilbert is founding Principal & Professor Emeritus, College of Health Disciplines, University of British Columbia. He is a Senior Scholar, WHO Collaborating Centre on Health Workforce Planning and Research, Dalhousie University; Adjunct Professor, Faculty of Graduate Studies, Dalhousie University. He holds the DR. TMA Pai Endowment Chair in Interprofessional Education & Practice, Manipal Academy of Higher Education, India, and is an Adjunct Professor, Faculty of Health, University of Technology, Sydney. He is Founding Chair, The Canadian Interprofessional Health Collaborative and has given over 220 keynote presentations in the past 10 years.

Professor Gilbert has been an Adjunct Professor, University of Pittsburgh, and at the National University of Malaysia. He was Co-Chair of the WHO Study Group on Interprofessional Education and Collaborative Practice.  He was elected a Fellow, Canadian Academy of Health Sciences, in 2008, was awarded the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Medal in April 2012, and in October 2013 received the Outstanding Lifetime Contribution to International Allied Health Development Award from the International Chief Health Professions Officers Organization.

Dr. Gilbert was appointed a Member of the Order of Canada, Canada’s highest civilian award, in July 2011. He received the degree Doctor of Laws, Honoris Causa from Dalhousie University in June 2016. He was the recipient of the Pioneer Award, National Center for Interprofessional Practice and Education, USA, 2017 for his ground-breaking work in advancing the field of interprofessional practice and education.

The Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies provides scholars with an exceptional opportunity to explore innovative research questions in a vibrant, interdisciplinary environment.  The search for a new Interim Director is ongoing, and we hope to announce a new appointment to that role in the coming months.

For more information on the Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies go to: https://pwias.ubc.ca/

IPR.Global Scholar Spotlight - Dr. Gérard Filies, University of the Western Cape (South Africa)

My name is Dr. Gérard Filies, and I am a registered Occupational Therapist by profession with a B.Sc. (Occupational Therapy) degree from the University of the Western Cape. I also have an M.Phil. (Health Sciences Education) Master’s degree from Stellenbosch University and obtained a PhD degree from the University of the Western Cape (UWC). My wife, Dr Sylnita Swartz-Filies, and I made history at UWC in 2018 by being the first married couple to both graduate with PhD degrees in the same ceremony. We were acknowledged by the Occupational Therapy Association of South Africa as the first married Occupational Therapy couple to achieve this accolade in the Western Cape. In 2019 we received the platinum award for the most inspirational couple from the I Do Magazine annual award ceremony in Johannesburg. The title of my PhD study was: Development of an interprofessional education model that aims to instill the core competencies of interprofessional collaborative practice in allied health students’ curriculum. 

At UWC, I am employed as a full time senior lecturer within the Interprofessional Education Unit (IPEU) in the Faculty of Community & Health Sciences. Responsibilities include: curriculum development, lectures, research, facilitation of faculty development workshops, co-ordination of interprofessional activities with postgraduate and undergraduate students, interprofessional supervision of students; and development of community sites for interprofessional placement of students for fieldwork. Research areas of interest include: Interprofessional Education, Service-Learning, Health Promotion, Primary Health Care and Community-Based Education. His current research project includes the use of 3D printing in interprofessional education and collaborative practice. Current teaching responsibilities at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels are: Primary Health Care, Interdisciplinary Health Promotion, Interprofessional Education World Café workshops, Interprofessional Ethics and Shared Research Methods. I am part of a team and was appointed as convenor for driving the process for registration and accreditation of the Postgraduate Diploma in Interprofessional Education and Health – a first of its kind in the Western Cape, if not a first in South Africa. The programme is currently being planned for implementation in August 2021. 

I have been invited by the Universities of Missouri and Winston Salem State University in the United States of America to develop their Interprofessional Education curriculum in 2018 and 2019. I was also invited to the Nelson Mandela University in 2019 as a guest speaker for interprofessional education and has facilitated a webinar series on interprofessional education and collaborative practice between 2019 and 2020 as part of capacity development for faculty members. I also served as the secretariat of the African Interprofessional Network (AfrIPEN) from 2017 to 2018 and is a member of Interprofessional Research.Global (IPR.Global).

Contact Dr. Gérard Filies: gfilies@uwc.ac.za

Interprofessional Research.Global Scholar Spotlight is a regular feature that highlights member research in Interprofessional Education and Collaborative Practice.  

Follow this link to submit content

Share your Interprofessional Education and Collaborative Practice research with a Global audience!

 

Submit a “Scholar Spotlight” for the Interprofessional Research.Global blog!

Write a paragraph or two on your interests and current work and share a photo, submitting through the following link: https://slu.az1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_20mcK3xSaIDaHWt 

Feel free to share anything about your work, here are some ideas on what you could include:

• Who are you? Where are you from? And what is your role?

• How did you first get involved in interprofessional education and research?

• What achievement are you most proud of in the area of interprofessional education and research?

• What does IPR.Global mean to you?

• What is your favorite pizza? (does pineapple even belong on pizza?) 

Include a photo and social media handles, so we can share to your network!