Published papers

Interprofessional education (IPE) for healthcare professionals is important in Japan because of its rapidlyaging population and increasingly complex healthcare needs. However, no tools have been validated inthe Japanese context to evaluate healthcare professionals’attitudes towards, or readiness for, IPE. Theprofessional version of the Readiness for Interprofessional Learning Scale (RIPLS) with 23 items wasselected for cross-cultural adaptation because it has been widely used internationally and a Japaneseedition of the student version has already been developed. We followed a guideline for cross-culturaladaptation and subsequently conducted factor analysis with 368 responses from over 16 professions.Face and content validity was confirmed through the translation process. We obtained four factors withgood internal consistency (Cronbach’s alpha > 0.7). These results were similar to those of the original UKstudy, apart from one factor being divided into two different factors in this study. Studies are required tofurther confirm the rigor and generalisability of the results; however, the Japanese RIPLS can be used toevaluate healthcare professionals’attitudes towards IPE, which can eventually lead to a better IPEdevelopment for healthcare professionals in Japan.

Transferring non-specialised tasks from registered nurses to nursing assistants may help registered nurses focus on specialised tasks. Optimising the workflow of nursing assistants by making their tasks more efficient may improve problems associated with the shortage of registered nurses. The nursing assistants at our hospital were stressed about referring inpatients to outpatient specialty clinics. Therefore, we initiated a project to optimise the referral process and reduce the time spent by nursing assistants on this task, with the collaboration of physicians, registered nurses and administrative assistants. The Training for Effective & Efficient Action in Medical Service–Better Process (TEAMS-BP) method, which was developed by modifying the Japanese Training Within Industry–Job Method, was used for the optimisation process. TEAMS-BP teaches users how to break each task down into its individual components, to scrutinise the details, and then to develop new processes by eliminating, combining, rearranging and simplifying tasks. At baseline, each referral took 10 min and was performed 39 times over 10 days in six wards. The first TEAMS-BP cycle did not yield satisfactory results for the nursing assistants. In the second TEAMS-BP cycle, participants included inpatient and outpatient physicians, registered nurses and administrative assistants. As a result, we changed the referral process from paper to electronic records and streamlined referrals that were ordered by inpatient physicians to outpatient physicians. The use of this method saved the equivalent of 175 hours of nursing assistants’ time per year at no additional cost. If we had been able to define the referral process as an interdisciplinary task and show the merits to each department from the beginning, we may have been able to form the interprofessional team in the first TEAMS-BP. Improving the efficiency of nursing assistants can allow other professionals to focus on their specialised tasks more effectively.