Abstract
In the last 20 years, the need for collaboration in health care has become ever more evident—no one health professional can now provide all the skills and services that constitute modern well-coordinated, high-quality, best patient care, especially for those with complex and/or chronic conditions. Despite good intentions, health systems have become increasingly fragmented and inefficient; in 2010 the World Health Organization described education for and implementation of collaboration as one of the most important ways to lead health systems from fragmentation to positions of strength. Interprofessional collaboration is ‘an active and ongoing partnership often between people from diverse backgrounds with distinctive professional cultures …who work together to solve problems or provide services’. Although this type of co-operation is often assumed to occur in health care, and tacitly assumed to be essential practice, in reality many gaps and duplications occur, both within and between health and social services.