Interprofessional collaboration in primary care teams: development and evaluation of a multifaceted programme to enhance patient-centredness and efficiency

Patients with chronic diseases do not only struggle with physical and psychological symptoms, but also with problems in other areas such as daily functioning and maintaining social contacts. The complexity of care requirements of these patients stresses the importance of proper care coordination and interprofessional collaboration between various disciplines with regard to drawing up care plans.

However, it is shown that drawing up care plans and having efficient team consultations is not so easy in practice. Interprofessional collaboration depends on several factors. This dissertation aims to identify the most relevant factors and develop an improvement programme.

The final programme consists of a framework allowing teams to reflect on their functioning, several training activities and a toolbox. The process evaluation shows that the programme can improve the functioning of interprofessional teams, provided that a number of recommendations are being followed.