Interpersonal Healthcare Team Relationships

Media ASL Scene [Video]. CC-BY-NC-SA 2021. Conestoga College.

A health care team is a group of professionals contributing to the care and treatment of a patient. The team typically consists of professionals from interdisciplinary areas such as physicians, nurses, and technologists.  Communication among members of a health care team is essential for quality patient care and effective team performance. Building cooperative and respectful team relationships assist in a patient’s perception of the care they are receiving. Critical patient information needs to be shared with members of health care teams to ensure a collaborative approach. Conversely, lack of communication creates opportunities for errors to occur, quality of care diminished, and can place patient safety at risk.

Assessing What You Already Know

As you complete this activity reflect on what you already know about teams and team dynamics.

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Interpersonal Dimensions of Health Care Teams

Many components are involved in working effectively in a health care team. Communication channels bring the team together to enable patient-centred care. Therapeutic communication is an important tool that helps put the patient at ease and builds trust in the health care team. When managing patient care each member of the team will have their own interpretation of the information presented and how the information is actioned can be dependent on each member’s uniqueness, expertise, and level of involvement within the team.

Interpersonal communication is the exchange of information between two or more people involving verbal and nonverbal methods. Developed interpersonal communication skills are vital to ensure collaboration with team members to support the best interest of patients. In most health care settings, teams are formed to support patient care and outcomes. A variety of teams are found in health care settings. They can be described as interprofessional care, collaborative care, shared care, or team care.

Collaboration and Open Communication

Collaboration described in the context of the health care team involves professionals undertaking interdependent roles working together, investing in shared strategies, problem-solving, and decision making to design care plans supporting patient outcomes. Inherently, effective teams who coordinate care successfully establish methods of communication, inclusive of data management systems, team meetings, and responses to rapidly evolving public health needs.

Collaboration is a collective action focused on achieving a common goal “in a spirit of harmony and trust” (Franklin, Bernhardt, Lopez, Long-Middleton, & Davis, 2015).

Interventions to support collaborative team dynamics include:

• remove the reliance on continuing the way things have always been done, try new approaches
• encourage change, look for opportunities to find solutions, and improve processes
• support transparency in all interactions
• recognize and celebrate collaboration within the team

Self-Awareness and Identity

Most humans form self-identities through their communication with others, and much of that interaction occurs in a group context. A group may be defined as three or more individuals who affiliate, interact, or cooperate in a familial, social, or work context (Grimes M. et al., 2018).

One should aim to acquire an understanding and develop a sense of when it is important to be the leader, the collaborator, and indeed, at times, the follower. Ultimately one moves back and forth between these roles over the course of a relationship, including the relationship with the client and relationships within interprofessional collaborative teams (Wagner. J. 2018).

Technology and the Impact on Health Care Team Communication

Technology has enhanced the accessibility of team communication in health care settings with the ability to communicate through the variety of devices and channels available.  Connected health care spaces enables more agile treatment plans to develop within the team. Health care innovation allows the sharing and analyzing of patient data with team members to support decision-making capabilities. Technology can strengthen therapeutic communication team relationships when used in a consistent manner to update team members and share information practices.