(78) Interprofessional Collaboration Competency Attainment through SilverScripts, a Collaborative Program with Community Senior Centers

Objective : This project aimed to evaluate interprofessional (IP) students’ self-reported change in collaboration-related competencies before and after their experience participating in the SilverScripts Program. SilverScripts includes students visiting senior centers to provide blood pressure measurements, medication reviews, and other services. The team sought to better understand the success of existing IP educational opportunities through SilverScripts to inform development and expansion of program IP educational opportunities in the future.

Methods: Students from Audiology, Nutrition, Pharmacy, and Social Work participated in SilverScripts in Fall 2022, including shared classroom sessions and visits to senior centers to provide services. Students were encouraged to work directly with one another across disciplines while providing care. All students involved were invited to complete electronic pre- and post-surveys which included all five-point Likert scale Interprofessional Collaborative Competencies Attainment Survey (ICCAS) items, as well as two additional open-ended post-survey items. Numeric values were assigned to Likert-scale item responses and pre- and post- means were compared using matched t-tests. Content analysis was performed on open-ended responses.

Results: Thirty-six students (2 audiology, 4 nutrition, 30 pharmacy) (response rate 28%) completed matched surveys. When comparing the means of their self-reported pre- and post-experience scores, responses showed an increase in learner perception of their abilities across all 20 domains (p < 0.05). Open-ended survey responses highlighted students’ perceived benefit of collaborative experiential learning over interdisciplinary classroom learning.

Conclusions: Students’ self-reported collaboration-related competency attainment significantly improved after participation in SilverScripts. Students attributed improvement in part to direct conversation across disciplines and interprofessional care provision they experienced through the program.