What do you think are the unique challenges associated with teamwork in health care? Explain your answer.
For me, I think that the main challenges associated with teamwork in health care include the differences in personalities, beliefs, and values among the members, the overlapping of duties or responsibilities, turf wars involving the scope of specialization, the length of time that members have spent together, and stress. Basically, in the health care field, almost ever day is a challenge as it mainly deals with the preservation of life and providing quality health services. However, the factors mentioned above can hamper a team’s effectiveness in health care.
One of the major challenges to teamwork in health care is the individuality of the members. For example, one person may choose finish his or her work in bulk while the other may choose to finish everything one at a time. Overlapping of duties is another major challenge as it can either give too much tasks to a certain team member or lessen the works that is originally assigned to another member. This can also lead to conflict especially if team members argue over who should take the credit.
Furthermore, turf wars involving the team members’ scope of specializations are also significant challenges to team work in health care. For example, one member is very good in doing one task that he tends to get mad at anyone who tries to help him or anyone who tries to tell him how to do his job. This can also involve questioning other members who perform tasks within his scope of specialization. In addition, the length of time that the members have spent together can also be a challenge in many ways. For example, if the team has been together too long, there could be too much familiarity among its members and lack of professionalism. In contrast if the team is still newly formed, there could be lack of chemistry among members of the team and thereby affecting their work. Finally, stress or being burnt out can contribute to changes in the team members mood and affect their performance.