In 2011, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) issued The Future of Nursing, Leading Change, Advancing Health report, which found that the nursing profession, the largest segment of the health care workforce, has an essential role in transforming the US health care system. Yet, the report cites barriers that need to be overcome to fully realize the potential for nursing, including addressing workforce policy to enable nurses to practice at the full extent of their education and training; ensuring seamless academic progress in the education system; and addressing workforce planning, data collection, and information systems.
Today, Sue Hassmiller, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation's (RWJF's) senior adviser for nursing and director of the IOM report, leads the Future of Nursing: Campaign for Action, a joint national initiative of the RWJF and AARP, to implement the IOM recommendations and ensure that nurses are valued members—and leaders—of health professional teams. Nurses' key role is especially important as health care increasingly emphasizes community-based health and well-being, moving away from acute care in hospitals and other settings.
As a result of her work with the Campaign for Action, Hassmiller created the idea for the Accelerating Interprofessional Community-Based Education and Practice program by forming a unique alliance that includes four key foundations: The John A. Hartford Foundation, the RWJF, the Josiah Macy Jr. Foundation, and the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation. The Accelerating program will help schools of nursing create robust, innovative, and sustainable interprofessional education programs. Through a competitive process, sixteen schools will be selected to participate in the two-year program. Nurses and their various kinds of teams will attend a three-day kick-off institute at the University of Minnesota in October 2016, where they will learn skills to launch, lead, and strengthen their community-based programs.
A primary intended outcome of the Accelerating program is more effective patient care in places where it's primarily delivered—in the community. The nurse leaders will also engage diverse health and other professionals, such as lawyers, architects, and urban planners, to form teams to learn and work together with patients and their families. This new model will also result in stronger education and training of not only nurses, but also other health professionals, as groups of students are closely taught and guided by the teams in community clinical settings.
The National Center for Interprofessional Practice and Education at the University of Minnesota is also a partner in the new program. As colleagues at the RWJF began to develop the Accelerating program vision, they recognized the value of close connections and additional funding from other foundations to raise visibility and increase participation. According to Hassmiller, "It was important that we place the program at the National Center for Interprofessional Practice and Education to draw on its vast body of evidence and leadership resources. . . . Given that our colleagues at the Macy, Hartford, and Moore Foundations were also very committed to interprofessional collaboration, it was a natural alliance."
Launched in 2012 with the support of the four foundations and the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), the National Center now advances interprofessional education and collaborative practice as a viable and efficient health care delivery model. Since that time, the center has helped hundreds of education and practice organizations and thousands of individuals to advance their own team-based care and education programs in support of the Institute of Healthcare Improvement's Triple Aim.
Acceelerating program participants will benefit from expertise developed in the National Center's growing Nexus Innovations Network, a national practice-based research network contributing data for comparative effectiveness research in interprofessional education and collaborative practice. Lessons learned and early findings from the network are now informing "what works" when creating National Center programming. Network data are housed in the National Center Data Repository, where they can be accessed and analyzed.
As a next step in the program's development, the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, an original investor in the National Center, will fund an evaluator that will work with the National Center team to track the progress of the sixteen Accelerating sites and help it to continuously improve its ability to support evidence-based interprofessional programming.
George Thibault, president of the Josiah Macy Jr. Foundation, was one of the early architects for the design and creation of the National Center. As an active and close adviser to the center, Thibault notes: "This grant is very important to us for three reasons: it promotes interprofessional education, it promotes nursing leadership, and it promotes community engagement. All of these are significant themes for us as part of our educational reform efforts."
Since the National Center's inception, its power has been interprofessional collaboration on a grand scale. And, while each foundation partner has a focus on health, each routinely brings different perspectives, substantial program experience, and good advice to the table. The power of the team of four funders was evident in crafting the Accelerating program's vision.
As Terry Fulmer, president of The John A. Hartford Foundation, states: "We are extremely excited about the leadership the National Center for Interprofessional Practice and Education is providing to our nation. As one of the supporting foundations, we are particularly pleased that this work furthers the efforts undertaken during the geriatric interdisciplinary team training and geriatric interdisciplinary team practice programs led by our Foundation in previous years. The opportunity to partner on this exciting project that accelerates interprofessional community-based education with such a strong collaborative of funders and leaders is a true pleasure. We are all grateful to Barbara Brandt for her leadership. "
To learn more about the National Center for Interprofessional Practice and Education and the Accelerating Interprofessional Community-Based Education and Practice program, visit nexusipe.org.
Editor's Note:
Related reading:
"Foundation Funding for the Nursing Profession," by Lee-Lee Prina, Health Affairs, July 2016 GrantWatch section.
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