University Close: A Digital Approach to Interprofessional Learning and Integrated Care

Key themes

• Inter-Professional Learning and Collaboration
• Person-Centred Integrated Care
• Innovative and Experiential Learning Design
• Progressive learning and development

Academics involved in the project

• Kelly Clifford: Principal Lecturer Inter-Professional Learning & Student Recruitment Lead, University of Bedfordshire.
• Janetta Baker: Principal Lecturer Simulated Practice Learning, University of Bedfordshire.

Aims and objectives

Aims:

To design and implement a reusable, realistic inter-professional learning (IPL) resource that embeds integrated, person-centred care within health and social care curricula, strengthening students’ collaborative skills, professional understanding, and preparedness for practice.

Objectives:

• Improve understanding of different professional roles and teamwork
• Support person-centred, integrated care
• Build students’ confidence, communication, and collaboration skills
• Promote wellbeing, resilience, and readiness for professional practice

Health and social care education faces increasing challenges in providing authentic interprofessional learning opportunities, particularly within the context of growing student numbers, placement capacity constraints, and the complexity of integrated care delivery. The University Close project was developed to address these challenges through a scalable digital learning solution that enables students to engage with realistic patient journeys and collaborative decision-making across professional boundaries.

Detail

University Close is a nurse-led digital initiative that brings neighbourhood health and integrated care directly into the curriculum through a dynamic, virtual community. Developed as an interactive e-learning package, it enables students to engage with realistic person-centred scenarios that reflect the complexities of contemporary health and social care practice (Health Education England, 2022)

Initially conceived as a complex multi-house scenario, the project was refined through staff discussions into a more focused and realistic model centred on a single individual with evolving health and social care needs. A dedicated subgroup was established to co-create the storyline, with leadership coordinating contributions and facilitating online collaboration to produce a draft scenario. This was initially constructed to be a passive resource via universities VLE system. However, as development progressed and digital innovation within healthcare education accelerated, opportunities emerged to transform the resource into a more interactive e-learning package.

At the centre of University Close is Phil Oke, a fictional resident whose story is inspired by real practice experiences shared by healthcare partners. Students follow Phil and his family as their health, wellbeing, and social circumstances evolve, reflecting the complexity and unpredictability of real-world care pathways. Throughout the nursing programme, student meet Phil and his family observing changes to the family dynamic, health status, and care needs overtime. This enables them to revisit the same patient journey at multiple points in their programme, progressively developing critical reasoning, collaborative decision making and understanding of integrated care pathways (McLoughlin et al., 2018).

The package combines storytelling and gamification was used to navigate each of the steps in Phil and his family’s journey (Strickland & Kayler, 2016). Branching decision making, reflective activities and simulated documentation tasks to mirror real world professional practice (Centre for the Advancement of Interprofessional Education (CAIPE) (2002).

This iterative and collaborative approach ensured the final resource was accessible, pedagogically sound, and capable of being embedded progressively across all years of study to support the development of inter-professional skills and integrated, person-centred practice (McLoughlin et al., 2018). This resource can be used across all years of study and supports simulated practice learning (SPL), enabling students to explore cases such as dementia care, hospital discharge, and community support. It’s flexible enough to be embedded in inter-professional modules, simulation days, and blended learning formats, bringing together nurses, midwives, social workers, police, and allied health professionals in shared learning (CAIPE, 2002).

University Close is more than a teaching tool, it’s a platform for inclusive, collaborative education that reflects the complexity of modern care. It responds directly to the challenges of limited placements, cross campus course delivery, rising workloads, and the urgent need to embed equity, diversity, and inclusion in everything we teach (Health Education England ,2022)

Impact

Analysis of the 66 responses demonstrated that University Close e-learning was highly valuable as a learning resource. Many respondents described in the free text section the scenarios as realistic, particularly valuing the patient journey, case-based learning, SBAR documentation activities, care planning exercises, and interactive conversations with Phil and his family. Overall, 78.8% of respondents reported that the e-learning enhanced their understanding of person-centred care, holistic assessment, communication skills, risk assessment, and interprofessional working, with many commenting that it helped bridge the gap between theory and practice. In addition, 78.8% stated that they would recommend the package to other students and considered it a highly useful learning tool.

Frequently reported strengths included the realistic storytelling, visual elements, interactive quizzes, and the flexibility to learn at their own pace. The findings suggest that University Close is an effective simulation-based learning resource that supports the development of interprofessional knowledge and skills, while providing an engaging and authentic learning experience. Student feedback also identified opportunities to further enhance usability and technical performance in future iterations.

Next steps

Future developments of this will expand the resource to include Years 2 and 3 of Phils journey enabling students to follow his longitudinal journey. Evaluation data will continue to be collected to ass the impact on student confidence and understanding of integrated care and interprofessional competencies.

 Although developed initially for nursing students, the resource has been designed for adaptation across multiple professional programmes. Its modular structure allows the scenarios to be tailored for social Work, midwifery, policing and allied health, making it a transferable model fort interprofessional education and competencies.

Links and references

• Centre for the Advancement of Interprofessional Education (CAIPE) (2002) Interprofessional education: A definition. Available at: https://www.caipe.org/what-is-interprofessional-education/ (Accessed: 18 June 2026).
• Health Education England (2022) Blended learning guidance report. Available at: https://www.hee.nhs.uk/sites/default/files/220405_Blended%2520Learning%2520Guidance%2520Report_FINAL.pdf (Accessed: 18 June 2026).
• McLoughlin C, Patel KD, O’Callaghan T, Reeves S. (2018) The use of virtual communities of practice to improve interprofessional collaboration and education: findings from an integrated review. Journal of Interprofessional Care.  Mar;32(2):136-142. Doi: 10.1080/13561820.2017.1377692.
• Strickland, H.P. and Kaylor, S.K. (2016) Bringing your a-game: Educational gaming for student success. Nurse Education Today, 40, pp. 101–103. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nedt.2016.02.014

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