Developing a Care Management Toolkit Through a Community Partnership 148 views

Background: Interprofessional collaboration is a foundational component of the American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN) Essentials for Doctoral Education in Nursing Practice and is critical for addressing complex healthcare challenges. Within the context of Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) projects, system-level problems often exceed the capacity of a single student due to their scope and organizational complexity. Purpose: Group-based DNP projects offer an effective approach to addressing these challenges and have shown promise in creating permanent change and system impact. One such example is a collaborative project between the University of Virginia (UVA) School of Nursing and the Virginia Center for Health Care Innovation (VCHI). Methods: This project was conducted under the Primary Pathways Initiative, a statewide effort to integrate mental health services into pediatric primary care across Virginia. The project’s primary objective was the development of a comprehensive toolkit to support case managers serving more than 30 pediatric primary care practices. Results/Conclusions: Collaboration among four DNP students and VCHI stakeholders enabled shared expertise, manageable workload distribution, and sustainable project development. This group approach enhanced project feasibility, supported long-term system change, and strengthened an ongoing collaboration between academic and healthcare innovation partners.

DNP (Doctor of Nursing Practice)

Group DNP Project; Collaboration

English

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2026-04-29