Coproducing Health Professions Education: A Prerequisite to Coproducing Health Care Services?

In 2016, Batalden et al proposed a coproduction model for health care services. Starting from the argument that health care services should demonstrate service-dominant rather than goods-dominant logic, they argued that health care outcomes are the result of the intricate interaction of the provider and patient in concert with the system, community, and, ultimately, society. The key notion is that the patient is as much an expert in determining outcomes as the provider, but with different expertise. Patients come to the table with expertise in their lived experiences and the context of their lives.The authors posit that education, like health care services, should follow a service-dominant logic. Like the relationship between patients and providers, the relationship between learner and teacher requires the integrated expertise of each nested in the context of their system, community, and society to optimize outcomes. The authors then argue that health professions learners cannot be educated in a traditional, paternalistic model of education and then expected to practice in a manner that prioritizes coproductive partnerships with colleagues, patients, and families. They stress the necessity of adapting the health care services coproduction model to health professions education. Instead of asking whether the coproduction model is possible in the current system, they argue that the current system is not sustainable and not producing the desired kind of clinicians.A current example from a longitudinal integrated clerkship highlights some possibilities with coproduced education. Finally, the authors offer some practical ways to begin changing from the traditional model. They thus provide a conceptual framework and ideas for practical implementation to move the educational model closer to the coproduction health care services model that many strive for and, through that alignment, to set the stage for improved health outcomes for all.