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31 Role Clarification and Negotiation: Definition and Descriptors

” . . . improving oral care at the bedside . . . tapping the right people on the shoulders as a nurse, I am not an expert in oral health . . . I do understand that the aspiration of the bacteria in your mouth can contribute to a hospital-acquired pneumonia. So I connected with the speech language pathologist and occupational therapist, and the entire nursing care team (given no oral health professional on the team at this time). I engaged with the team on the unit . . . and when we’re reading the patient for discharge . . . whether that’s at home or they’re returning to an extended care facility, we still want them to have their functional abilities that they came in with and part of that is being able to get dressed, brush their teeth, take care of their dentures . . . I learned so much from those other professions . . . oral care improved on the unit.”

Sarah Beckman, nurse

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“When we are working together . . . it reduces errors and it results, ultimately in better patient care. . . . Explain to your colleagues what it is that you can contribute and what it is that you can take on, they have a better appreciation of a way to kind of divide the task, divide the workload, so that we can make sure that the clients are getting their needs met. So, being very clear about what I can do, but also being comfortable asking what can you do? And there may be some overlap, but maybe today it makes more sense for me to take the lead on something and maybe tomorrow it makes more sense for you to take the lead on something. It all depends on what the client needs and what the client might prefer.”

Vicki Verge, social worker

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Introduction to Collaborative Team-Based Care Copyright © 2025 by Office of Interprofessional Collaboration, Rady Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Manitoba is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License, except where otherwise noted.

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