Canadian interprofessional education: Publicly available information and educator perspectives

Interprofessional Education (IPE) offered by Canadian post-secondary institutions has seen considerable variation over the years. While IPE remains strong at some institutions, others have scaled back on their support. The purpose of this study was to appraise the current state of IPE in Canada. Toward this aim, this study consisted of an environmental scan of the websites of Canadian universities and colleges to identify publicly available information related to their IPE offerings and interviews with 16 faculty. Informed by Basil Berstein's sociology of education, a qualitative content analysis was performed to analyze the interview data and descriptive statistics and Fisher's Exact test was completed to analyze quantitative data derived from the web scan. This study identified 102 Canadian post-secondary institutions that offer IPE events/workshops, courses, and/or institution-wide programs. Data related to IPE curricula, pedagogy, and evaluation suggested three threats to collaboration when designing IPE curricula: 1) IPE emphasizing clinical over collaborative skills; 2) a lack of collaboration between faculty and educational experts when designing IPE; and 3) a lack of representation in IPE materials of the diverse professions involved in IPE. Relating findings to Azzam and colleague's model of sustainable IPE, the authors recommend that additional consideration be paid to the influence frameworks produced by national and global governing organizations, that more research is needed to fill gaps in our understanding of student-focused IPE pedagogy and how IPE is evaluated, and that praxis (putting IPE theory into practice) is necessary to mitigate threats to IPE sustainability. • 67 professions participate in IPE, but learning materials reflect fewer professions. • Prioritizing clinical skills over collaboration is a threat to IPE sustainability. • IPE frameworks by national and global organizations support IPE sustainability. • Gaps exist in understanding student-focused IPE pedagogy and how IPE is evaluated. • Collaboration between faculty and educational experts puts IPE into practice.