Pei Chen's Curriculum Featured in AIHC Newsletter Article Written by Todd James

Pei Chen, MD’s curriculum was featured in an articled entitled "IPC in San Francisco" written by Todd James, MD for the November 2019 American Interprofessional Health Collaborative (AIHC) newsletter. See copy of article below:

IPC in San Francisco by Todd James [Published in November 2019 AIHC newsletter]

A Primary Care Clinic in San Francisco Creates an Interprofessional Learning Community

Interprofessional collaboration (IPC) is an integral part of high-quality healthcare in outpatient clinics.  Since the fall of 2017, the University of California San Francisco (UCSF) Center for Geriatric Care, a geriatric ambulatory primary care practice has hosted an interprofessional (IP) learning community, under the direction Mackenzie Clark (Pharmacy), Michele Sharma (Medical Social Work), Yvonne Troya (Law), Pei Chen (Medicine).

In this IP learning community, geriatric fellows, pharmacy residents and students, social work interns, and law students learn together, see patients together, and utilize IPC to manage a panel of older adults with multimorbidity over the course of the academic year. After two years of the pilot, 83 learners have participated, including 44 of them having to two or more noon conferences. Learners have rated the collaborative environment highly as demonstrated by the Assessment for Collaborative Environment (ACE-15) survey.  The have reported increased interprofessional competency via responses to the Interprofessional Collaborative Competencies Attainment Survey.

At the end of two years, 63 patients received care from the IP learners. These patients and the families have high confidence in the interprofessional care received and recommend the team to others. Furthermore, the patients who have received care from the IP learning community take one less medication as compared to when they first established care.

Qualitative themes from the learners as well as the clinical and administrate staff included recognition of the IPC, comprehensive care, and high satisfaction. The pilot demonstrated the feasibility of implementing workplace IP learning in an academic geriatric primary care setting as we balance the demands of patient care and education and prepare the future workforce to work collaboratively