HEALTHCARE MANAGEMENT zyxwvutsrqpon FORUM GESTION DES SOINS DE SANTE zyxwvu - ORIGINAL ARTICLE Abstract Interdisciplinary team collaboration is considered an essential component of most health care ser- vices. The overall goal of such col- laborationin mental health services/ psychiatry is to provide a compre- hensive biopsychosocial perspective treatment stan- designed to formulate a rdisciplinaryteam stan- nt care. This article pre- ards and provides an f the interdisciplinary thin one service -is also included. bio-psycho-sociale et de la zyxwvutsrqpon ent and Ev nterdisciplinary Tea tandards of Patient Car M. Atkinson and L. Caldwell by L. Beverley, D. Dobson n September 1991, the Department of Psychiatry and its I various practice areas within the Foothills Medical Centre were surveyed by the Canadian Council on Health Services Accreditation (CCHSA). Foothills Medical Centre is a large urban teaching hospital in Calgary, affiliated with the University of Calgary. The accreditation process consisted of formative and summative evaluation of specific patient care areas with respect to their internal development and level of compliance with national standards. Following the com- pletion of this survey, the CCHSA recom- mended that interdisciplinary standards of patient care be developed. Subsequently, a focus group to the Department of Psychiatry Quality Assurance Committee was struck to work toward the development, implementa- tion and evaluation of interdisciplinary team standards of patient care. Efforts were made to include representa- tives from all disciplines and programs on the newly formed Interdisciplinary Patient Care Team Standards (IPCTS) Committee. Members of this development team included representatives from professional disciplines within the department, including psychiatry, nursing, psychology, occupational therapy, social work and psychiatry administration. These representatives worked within various programs within the Adolescent and Adult Outpatients Service divisions (Young Adult Program, Psychiatry Assessment Services, Adult Outpatient Clinics and Day Program). Once formed, the group conducted a review of published literature and a comparison of professional standards in the different disci- plines. This initial comprehensive literature search established the imperative for the pro- ject when it revealed that no published inter- disciplinary standards of care were available. Discipline-specific standards have existed for some and some efforts have been made to operationalize these standards for dif- ferent settings.*,9 Discussions have also been held about the integration of professional practice and quality assurance program^.^,'^ Few articles addressed issues pertaining to interdisciplinary care, although Pattison and colleagues" described the development of an interdisciplinary code of ethics for community mental health programs, and another paper by Davis discussed the move from a multidisci- plinary to an interdisciplinary approach in a rehabilitation setting.I2 These authors devel- oped a set of guidelines incorporating a client- oriented approach to goal planning and setting and interdisciplinaryinput. Marian~~(P.~~) cites an early explanation from Schein for such a dearth of findings: The professions have been unable to look at problems holistically, do not use total- systems concepts, have not articulated the interconnections between their areas of traditional responsibility and have not striven to reduce the conceptual bound- aries that exist between the disciplines. Optimistically, Mariano makes a strong case for interdisciplinary collaboration, and indeed some preliminary gains have been made toward this goal. For example, GalassoI3 has published guidelines for clini- cians when developing multidisciplinary treatment plans. Similarly, we have developed a Collaborative Practice Model, which is defined as one "where care givers and sup- port staff function independently in patient WINTER 1997, VOL. 10, NO. 4 @ HIVER 1997, VOL. 10, NO. 4