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PORTLAND, Maine

UNE student team chosen for national competition in health professions

An interprofessional team of University of New England graduate students in health professions was chosen to represent the university at the national CLARION Case Competition to be held April 11-12, 2014, hosted by the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis. UNE competed in the national competition for the first time last year and came in second place. The event is dedicated to furthering interprofessional collaboration for the sake of patient safety and improved health care quality.

This year’s winning team was chosen among six UNE teams in a competition on March 8 on the Portland campus. This year’s winning team is: Paige Curran, Class of 2015, College of Pharmacy; Elizabeth Han, Class of 2017, College of Osteopathic Medicine; Maari Josephson, Class of 2014, Westbrook College of Health Professions (Occupational Therapy); and Gwendolyne Tuttle, Class of 2015, Westbrook College of Health Professions (Masters in Social Work).

Judges for this year’s competition were: Lisa Letourneau, MP, MPH, Executive Director, Maine Quality Counts; Sylvie Demers, LCSW, Regional Director, Counseling Services, Inc.; Scott Rusk, M.D., Chief Medical Officer, Vice-President Medical Administration, Mercy Hospital; Bill Brennan, PharmD, BCACP, Rural Health Clinical Pharmacy Specialist, VA Lewiston-Auburn; Becca Boulos, PhD, MPH, Assistant Clinical Professor, UNE School of Community and Population Health; and Benjamin Hagopian, MD, MPH, Maine Medical Partners Falmouth Family Practice.

The competition at UNE was arranged by UNE’s Interprofessional Student Advisory Team (IPSAT). The prize money of $3,000 will be divided among the winning team members. Funding for the competition at UNE was provided by the Office of the Provost along with a mini-grant from UNE’s Center for Excellence in Interprofessional Education (CEIPE) and a matching grant from the Office of Research and Scholarship. UNE will fund the airfare and lodging for the national event where students have the opportunity to win up to $7,500.

The local and national competitions require teams of four students, with no more than two students represented from the same profession, present for 20 minutes on solving a patient case study. Each team performs a root cause analysis detailing what went wrong in that patient case – this year the focus is on congestive heart failure. Although the patient case has clinical components, it will also have elements from a variety of health professions, leading up to a sentinel event. Presentations are followed by 10-minute question and answer sessions with judges representing clinical and health care administration.

Past national competitions have included the following schools: University of Minnesota; Medical University of South Carolina; Dartmouth
Virginia Commonwealth University; University of Missouri; University of Tennessee; Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center; University of Kansas; University of Kentucky; Case Western Reserve University; University of the Incarnate Word; and Army-Baylor University Health Sciences

About the University of New England

The University of New England is Maine’s largest independent university, with two beautiful coastal campuses in Maine, a one-of-a-kind study abroad campus in Tangier, Morocco, and an array of flexible, accredited online degrees. In an uncommonly welcoming and supportive community, we offer hands-on learning, empowering students to make a positive impact in a world full of challenges. The state’s top provider of health professionals, we are home to Maine’s only medical college, Maine’s only dental college, a variety of other interprofessionally aligned health care degree programs, as well as nationally recognized programs for marine science degrees, natural and social sciences degrees, arts and humanities degrees, and business degrees.