Brian Cross, PharmD, FNAP
Assistant Vice Provost & Director, Center for Interprofessional Collaboration
East Tennessee State University
Dr. Cross is the Assistant Vice Provost, and Director of The Center for Interprofessional Collaboration at the East Tennessee State University Academic Health Sciences Center, which includes five colleges (Health Sciences, Medicine, Nursing, Pharmacy, and Public Health) and more than fifteen health professions training programs. He has 30+ years of clinical experience in many ambulatory areas including the Indian Health Service, the VA Health System, Endocrinology and Cardiology, Academic Practices, and Multispecialty Private Practice Medical Groups giving him a broad understanding of establishing collaborative/interprofessional services in many settings which included establishing prescribing authority, developing collaborative practice agreements, and creating mechanisms for reimbursement. He’s been awarded multiple teaching awards from colleges of pharmacy, nursing, and medicine at multiple universities. He has spoken on the connection between collaborative practice and learning/training at national and international meetings. He was a Fulbright Scholar in 2018 at the Royal College of Surgeons of Ireland focusing on the bridge between Interprofessional Learning and Collaborative Practice. He was awarded fellowship status in 2024 in the National Academies of Practice – the only interprofessional group of healthcare practitioners and scholars dedicated to supporting affordable, accessible, coordinated quality healthcare for all.

Presenting at the Nexus Summit:

Background, including statement of problem, and aims:The WHO (2010) called for preparing faculty to facilitate IPE. However, faculty feel ill-prepared to facilitate IPE (Ratka et al., 2017). Most health professions students are not trained as IPE facilitators. IPE Programs are challenged to hire faculty ready to facilitate IPE. Hoffman, Harris and Rosenfield (2009) have outlined the importance of mentorship in IPE. DrPH students participated as part of a larger cohort of advanced learners to receive IPE facilitator training. Additionally, DrPH students committed to a second year of training…
This lightning talk describes the creation of an interprofessional faculty fellowship through the collaboration of a College of Health Sciences and a Center for Interprofessional Collaboration at a state university. We cover the rationale, logistics (finances & faculty time allotment/distribution), proposed structure and intended measurable outcomes for success of the program.Recent publications have called for the systematic approach to advancing IPE research, suggesting findings should have reproducibility, replicability, and generalizability of findings (Gunaldo et al. 2023). More…
This lightning talk describes training for interprofessional cohorts of advanced learners. We cover the rationale, pilot and full implementation of the program, training topics, and assessment. Finally, we share lessons learned and modifications from initial implementation. The WHO (2010) called for preparing faculty to facilitate IPE. However, faculty feel ill-prepared to facilitate IPE (Ratka et al., 2017). Clinicians are not trained as educators or IPE facilitators. IPE Programs are challenged to hire faculty ready to facilitate IPE. We developed an innovative program training advanced…