**2. Interdisciplinary teams in the emergency department to respond to the opioid crisis**

### **2.1 Team building conceptual framework**

Building on conceptual work on multi and interdisciplinary teamwork in translational science [3, 4], this study examines how team building interactions and phases affect [5] team members' response to initiating opioid use disorder (OUD) treatment for patients in the ED. We relied on the science of team science (SciTS) framework to explore the key challenges and solutions to promoting interdisciplinary collaborations (see **Table 1**). SciTS seeks to understand barriers and facilitators of collaborative and team-based research efforts and identify conditions, understand processes, and achieve outcomes associated with team objectives [6]. Barriers and facilitators are at different levels, including intrapersonal (own knowledge and competencies brought to the team), interpersonal (communication, connection and shared knowledge among team members), physical environment (structure of communication, collaboration, execution and problem solving), societal and political (community norms, political discourse), and technological (communication, connection, description). Understanding interactions and interdependencies between these factors can lead to a better understanding of the process of how team becomes effective in addressing critical issues. Furthermore, using SciTS to understand how to develop and support interdisciplinary collaboration may lead to effective translation of research findings into practice [6, 7].

We rely on a cultural exchange approach (see **Table 1**), which centers on sharing of ideas and knowledge between group members representing different professional systems, to help us understand the transaction of knowledge, attitudes, and practices that occurs during interactions [8]. During this process, we evaluated a series of discrete activities and document aspects from team science (space, communication, knowledge) to identify how team-building exercises ultimately enhanced problemsolving. This method consisted of evaluating four conditions through team building activities: 1) groups' accessibility to one another; 2) a sense of mutual respect; 3) creation of a shared language; 4) willingness to compromise/accommodate the needs

*Building Interdisciplinary Teams in Emergency Care to Respond to National Emergencies… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.99206*


**Table 1.** *Frameworks.*

of others [8]. These activities are essential to bridging and merging diverse perspectives and transcending disciplinary boundaries.

This study focuses on assembling a interdisciplinary team of scholars (Social Work, Nursing, and Medicine) at a research University and undertaking a team-building process so as to build interdisciplinary approaches to 'wicked problems' [9]. We implemented team-building activities and assessed the process of becoming an interdisciplinary team while conducting a research study addressing ED responses to the opioid epidemic (IRB # RC010001). The efficacy of ED responses to the opioid epidemic can be considered a 'wicked problem' requiring a interdisciplinary approach, because such responses are influenced by contradictory and changing conditions and are seemingly intractable for any given discipline [9]. Our findings may inform strategies for constituting and preparing interdisciplinary teams to effectively respond to challenging issues, and to understand transformational experiences that may support the achievement of their common goals.
