IPE-ACTS: Teaching Health Professional Students IPEC Core Competencies Through an Applied Team-based Health Challenge Competition

Interprofessional education is a core competency, an accreditation requirement, and difficult to initiate across health professional schools. IPE-ACTS (Interprofessional Education – Achieving Collaborative Team Solutions) was created as Emory University’s interprofessional training program for medicine, nursing, and public health students. IPE-ACTS provides students with online instruction in IPEC core competencies(1) and an applied interprofessional team competition to identify solutions to Atlanta-based health inequities.Implementation: The Woodruff Health Sciences Center Office of Interprofessional Education and Collaborative Practice created and launched IPE-ACTS in 2024.(2) Ten health challenges were chosen and students were placed in interprofessional teams to work on their challenge. Faculty Champions, interprofessional Emory faculty/staff, developed and led the health challenges for 1,305 students during the in-person IPE-ACTS Day. The 132-student teams created a team contract and ideas for their health challenge. Teams then met for six weeks to develop a five-minute video that was judged by their Faculty Champion and subject matter experts. The top team from each health challenge advanced to the final round to present their winning concepts.Evaluation plan: Students completed individual pre- and post-course assessments (ISVS21) and a team evaluation. A subset participated in focus groups to provide qualitative feedback.Outcome(s) and significance: Students appreciated the focus on health challenges as a goal for working in interprofessional teams and felt IPE-ACTS enhanced their understanding of IPEC Core Competencies. For most components of the ISVS21, student scores increased post IPE-ACTS compared to baseline. Specifically, students felt more comfortable being a team leader, describing their health profession, and raising issues supporting client care (p< 0.01 for all). Student feedback noted too many asynchronous learning modules and inconsistent team engagement. In response, the 2025 IPE-ACTS has been consolidated into a single-day in-person interprofessional “hackathon" health challenge competition. The asynchronous modules were streamlined and reflect the updated IPEC core competencies.(3)