As a baccalaureate-prepared nurse, your participation and leadership in interdisciplinary teams will be vital to the health outcomes of your patients and organization. One way to design an improvement project is by using the Plan-Do-Study-Act (PDSA) cycle.

Leadership Strategies That Could Lead to an Interdisciplinary Solution

According to Folkman et al. (2019), leaders can use strategies to promote interdisciplinary collaboration, including shared leadership, appreciative inquiry, and emotional intelligence. Shared leadership entails recognizing each member of the multidisciplinary team as necessary. Each member has a specific specialty knowledge base that can generate solutions to the existing problem. Emotional intelligence requires the leader to focus on the strengths and achievements of team members rather than being judgmental (Folkman et al., 2019). This is an enabler of trust and teamwork among members. Like emotional intelligence, appreciative inquiry focuses on and reinforces employees’ strengths. This encourages collaboration and participation in finding a solution. These three strategies will enable the interprofessional team to develop evidence-based practices that reduce the incidences of ventilator-associated pneumonia.

Collaboration Approaches for Interdisciplinary Teams

Different collaborative approaches can be used to improve the interdisciplinary team’s cooperation to address the problem of VAP. The first strategy is open communication (Folkman et al., 2019). Effective communication helps to create goals and objectives for the team. In this context, the goal is to minimize the incidence of VAP. It also helps to avoid role ambiguity by describing the tasks to be performed by each team member. Open communication helps team members create a good rapport and increases their willingness to share information (Folkman et al., 2019). Information sharing is essential in research and establishing evidence-based practices. The second strategy is training. Training equips the team members with the necessary skills and knowledge to accomplish their tasks (Folkman et al., 2019). In this context, training can focus on the best mechanical ventilation techniques and how to ensure good oral hygiene. Training will enable team members to identify their unique roles in realizing established goals.

The other strategy is rewarding. The best-performing team members should be rewarded. As a result, this motivates other members and increases the quality of service provision (Buljac-Samardzic et al., 2020). By so doing, the goal of the team is accomplished. Performance feedback should enable teammates to evaluate themselves and their efforts. It allows them to modify their activities appropriately to achieve group goals and objectives.

References

Álvarez-Lerma, F., Palomar-Martínez, M., Sánchez-García, M., Martínez-Alonso, M., Álvarez-Rodríguez, J., Lorente, L., Arias-Rivera, S., García, R., Gordo, F., Añón, J. M., Jam-Gatell, R., Vázquez-Calatayud, M., & Agra, Y. (2018). Preventing ventilator-associated pneumonia: The multimodal approach of the Spanish ICU “pneumonia zero” program. Critical Care Medicine, 46(2), 181–188. https://doi.org/10.1097/CCM.0000000000002736