The world we live in, as we all know, is getting smaller due to new technologies, modes of communication and patterns of population movements that crisscross the borders between disciplines and countries. These patterns have brought new innovations as well as challenges to healthcare, making it imperative to become more interdisciplinary and global. All of that places new demands on healthcare and has also challenged the status quo in education among the professions of medicine, nursing midwifery, and public health. To meet the needs of the new millennium, we have realized that we must challenge ourselves to also crisscross the borders of our minds with new knowledge from other professions, to integrate this knowledge to prepare new generations of healthcare professionals who are interprofessional and interdisciplinary.
The Lancet Commission, a group of cutting-edge thinkers from across the disciplines and the globe, has called on us to create “a new era of professional education that advances transformative learning and harnesses the power of interdependence in education, as well as to leverage knowledge advanced globally.” I proudly served with others in this group which is urging professions to learn from each other’s discoveries and challenges to shape professional education for the future and to transform the healthcare system. The objective is to meet the Millennium Development Goals for quality healthcare.
The Carnegie Foundation, The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the Lancet Commission, and the Institute of Medicine all produced many reports that inspire us with challenging recommendations. Let’s use these recommendations to create a future. Let’s pool and integrate our expertise for a future of better healthcare and a more humane and just healthcare system.
