The Hole in the Heart of Paediatric Cardiology Education: Are Healthcare Professionals on the Island of Ireland Ready for Interprofessional Education?
A mixed-methods study of paediatric cardiology professionals across the island of Ireland reveals high readiness and strong willingness for interprofessional education, indicating that the primary barrier to implementation is not a lack of motivation but rather the need for better coordination within the existing cross-jurisdictional clinical network.
Original paper licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). This is an AI-generated explanation of the paper below. It is not written or endorsed by the authors. For technical accuracy, refer to the original paper. Read full disclaimer
Children born with heart defects face a journey that begins with surgery and often extends well into adulthood. In the past, such complex care was usually concentrated in a single, massive hospital. Today, to keep families closer to home, this care is often spread out across a network of smaller local centers, supported by a few major hubs. This arrangement brings specialists to the patient's doorstep, but it also means that the medical teams in these local centers must be just as skilled and coordinated as those in the big hospitals. When a child needs care, a wide variety of experts must work together seamlessly: doctors, nurses, physiotherapists, dietitians, and even chaplains. If these different groups do not understand each other's roles or cannot communicate effectively, the quality of care can suffer. This is why experts have long argued that these professionals should learn together, not just in their own separate groups, but in mixed teams where they can learn from one another's perspectives.
A new study set out to see if the healthcare workers caring for children with heart defects across the entire island of Ireland were ready for this kind of shared learning. The researchers focused on a unique network that treats the whole island as a single system, connecting hospitals in both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. They wanted to know if the doctors, nurses, and other specialists felt prepared to sit in a room with colleagues from different professions and learn together. They also wanted to understand what was currently happening in terms of training and what might be stopping these teams from learning together more often.
To find the answers, the team sent an online survey to staff working in eight different medical centers across the island. They reached out to thirty professionals, including doctors, nurses, and a diverse group of other specialists like speech therapists and cardiac physiologists. The survey asked these workers how ready they felt to learn with other professions and gathered their stories about past training experiences. The results were surprisingly clear: almost everyone who responded felt very ready to learn together. The desire to collaborate was strong across all groups, with the highest enthusiasm found for the idea of teamwork itself. In fact, nine out of ten people said they would attend a certified training day open to all professions, whether it was held online or in person. No one said they would refuse to attend.
Despite this eagerness, the study found that the current system for teaching these teams is broken in several ways. While the willingness to learn was high, the actual opportunities to do so were scattered and inconsistent. About one in five of the respondents had never experienced this kind of mixed-profession training before they finished their own university degrees. More concerning was that nearly a quarter of the staff reported having no regular teaching available to them at all. Even in the main hospital that hosts the weekly training sessions, many staff members were not aware that the sessions existed. The training that did exist was often uncoordinated, with some professionals feeling left out. Specifically, the allied health and social care workers, such as dietitians and physiotherapists, often felt overlooked compared to the doctors and nurses, who seemed to be the main focus of most educational events.
The researchers discovered that the biggest obstacle was not a lack of interest, but a lack of organization. The staff described a situation where good ideas for training were happening in isolated pockets, driven by individual enthusiasts rather than a central plan. Some teams had built their own local programs, but these were not shared across the network. The professionals expressed a strong desire for training that helped them understand how other centers organized their work and how to improve their own services together. They also wanted practical training on how to handle difficult situations as a team, such as breaking bad news or managing complex surgeries, in a safe environment where they could make mistakes and learn without fear of judgment.
The study concludes that the people doing the work are ready. The island's healthcare network has already successfully unified the clinical care of children with heart defects, treating the entire region as one system. Now, the same approach can be applied to education. The barrier is not the attitude of the staff, who are eager to learn from one another, but the coordination of the training itself. By organizing existing resources better, inviting everyone to the table, and creating structured opportunities for mixed teams to learn, the network can ensure that every child receives the best possible care from a team that truly works together. The foundation is already there; it simply needs to be built upon with intention and structure.
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