From leadership research to district action: Nursing students’ readiness and training needs for interprofessional education: A cross-sectional study in South Korea

AI-assisted editorial implementation guide. Proposed district actions are separate from the original authors’ findings and recommendations. Independent peer review of this guide is not asserted.

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Evidence and transfer

Education-related source: verify which participants, institutions and outcomes were actually studied before district adoption. Source publication type: research-article. License and identity checks do not establish study quality or causality.

Original authors’ abstract, reproduced under the source license:

The significance of interprofessional education (IPE) in fostering interprofessional collaboration is being increasingly emphasized in healthcare. This study analyzed the training needs of nursing students based on the Interprofessional Education Collaborative Core Competencies using a descriptive, cross-sectional design. A structured survey of 108 fourth-year nursing students in Korea was conducted between June and July 2024. Data were analyzed with SPSS 27.0, using the Borich needs assessment model and importance-performance analysis (IPA). The analysis identified a critical need for focused educational intervention to enhance collaborative skills. Specifically, the results highlighted Teams and Teamwork and Roles and Responsibilities as priority areas for improvement, with a need for students to better define and differentiate roles, communicate with clarity and cultural humility, and advance team reasoning and shared leadership strategies. The findings indicate that the Core Competencies are not sufficiently integrated into nursing curricula to meet nursing students’ training needs. Therefore, curriculum developers must prioritize focused programs that enhance nursing students’ understanding of their roles, responsibilities, and cooperative strategies to effectively integrate IPE into nursing education and bridge these professional gaps. Convenience sampling and reliance on self-report data are acknowledged as limitations of this study.

Study methods

This research utilized a descriptive, cross-sectional design to identify nursing students’ perceptions of and readiness for IPE. It also explored the training topics that learners need to cover according to interprofessional CCs, aiming to develop an IPE simulation program for healthcare. It should be noted that this study assessed the needs for IPE simulation programs; it does not report on delivering a simulation program.

Limitations

IPC is essential for providing safe, patient-centered healthcare services, and requires effective IPE. Despite the recognized need for IPE among healthcare students and professionals, its integration into regular coursework is limited. This study provides foundational data on the training needs of nursing students for interprofessional CCs. The results highlight the importance of developing specific competencies related to Roles and Responsibilities and collaboration teamwork. Accordingly, educational programs should consider fostering shared leadership based on mutual respect and preparing students to work collaboratively in diverse healthcare settings. This study serves as a foundation for further research and curriculum development efforts aimed at enhancing interprofessional education in nursing.

A 90-day district inquiry

Days 1–15 · Appraise. Read the source methods, recruitment, comparator, outcomes and limitations. Record how the study setting differs from your district and which claim the design can support.
Days 16–30 · Design. Choose one school improvement question with teachers. Protect a short shared planning cycle, agree an instructional change and use a common rubric for examining student work. Agree participation, privacy protections, baseline and stopping rules before starting.
Days 31–60 · Observe. Collect the pre-agreed measures, keep a log of implementation changes and invite confidential voluntary feedback. Preserve existing support for staff and learners.
Days 61–90 · Decide. Review implementation fidelity, teacher time and independently scored student work against a recorded baseline. Examine access differences and competing explanations before attributing changes to leadership. Make a dated decision to stop, revise or extend the inquiry.

Board decision brief

Present the local problem, source setting, evidence limits, intervention, responsible owner, total cost, measured changes and uncertainty. Separate staff perceptions, implementation measures and student learning outcomes.

Attribution and reuse

Sun-Yi Yang. Nursing students’ readiness and training needs for interprofessional education: A cross-sectional study in South Korea. PLOS One (2026-04-21). https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0342320

Prepared 2026-11-07. Source authorship and DOI are preserved. The abstract and source passages are attributed extracts; this editorial guide is offered under the same CC BY 4.0 license.