Co-Health is a two-year Action Research project in the area of healthcare supported by Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Torino (Savings Bank Turin Foundation). The project aims to plan, test and evaluate a transferable protocol concerning active education for doctors and nurses in order to strengthen their soft skills.
Co-Health
October 2013 – November 2015
Co-Health is a two-year Action Research project in the area of healthcare supported by Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Torino (Savings Bank Turin Foundation). The project aims to plan, test and evaluate a transferable protocol concerning active education for doctors and nurses in order to strengthen their soft skills and in particular skills related to:
- handling the relationship with the patient
- handling the relationship with the family members
- communicating the healing treatment
- performing an effective team work
The achievement of these skills is a frame in the general purpose of increasing the quality level in the education for healthcare personnel, as well as of improving, both in quality and efficacy, the healing relationship with the patient.
This research assumption is that soft skills are pivotal to get a successful outcome in the healing treatment of the patient. The Co-Health project minds to use innovative techniques of the Social and Community Theatre methodology to strengthen the workers soft skills.
Promoting institutions and partners. The Social and Community Theatre Centre, Department of Humanities, is the promoting institution of the project along with the partnership of the Bachelor of Science in Nursing course (in Turin and Cuneo), the Department of Public Health and Pediatrics, the Department of Culture, Politics and Society, the Medical School, the Bachelor of Midwifery course at the University of Turin, Fondazione Medicina a Misura di Donna (Medical Foundation for Women’s Health), SIPNEI – Società Italiana di Psico Neuro Endocrino Immunologia (Italian Society of Psycho Neuro Endocrino Immunology).
DoRS – Centro Regionale di Documentazione per la Promozione della Salute (Regional Documentation Centre for Health Promotion) is also cooperating in this project.
Target audience. The research course is structured in two-year-long activities and the target audience is:
- 2 interprofessional groups of medical and nursing students;
- 1 interprofessional group of healthcare professionals working in the local area and probably, as members of the same health unit
Each group will be trained in an educational workshop course of 50 hours and 30 hours.
The patients and their family, who are in close contact with the trained health workers or the students on internship, will be an indirect audience of the course.
At the end of this research, an international conference will present the results.
Evaluation. The evaluation is shaped up by a quantitative-qualitative process and takes into consideration for the first time, the fieldwork of the group under analysis.
Each test group will be provided with:
- 1 evaluation pre-test for each participant
- scientific evaluation on the training efficacy, according to the following tools: post-test, simulation and field study
The evaluation on the protocol efficacy refers to an indipendent team from the one in charge of the training, in order to guarantee the objectivity of analysis and evaluation on the protocol efficacy.
Interdisciplinarity. This research will also avail itself of a comparison with the disciplines of anthropology and neurosciences with the aim of implementing the action plan, integrating the interpretation both of processes and results, as well as producing additional evaluation data for the protocol definition.
The multidisciplinary approach is the strong point in this research and its original feature. When the results will be achieved, this startup project would stand for a European standard of excellence in this field of research.
Scientific Committee and project team. The Scientific Committee is composed by the spokespeople in the University Departments involved in the project, by an expert in neuroscience, by representatives of the medical institutions and foundations involved, by the P.I. (Principal Investigator) Alessandro Pontremoli and P.M. (Project Manager) Alessandra Rossi Ghiglione, who conceived the project.
The project team takes advantage of the University researchers, performing arts and theatre experts, observers, communication, organization and management experts.
