Pictured (left to right): Alison Frances-Cracknell and Zahra Aziz (Monash University), Julie Gustavs (AMC) and Alexandra Webb (ANZAHPE)
A multidisciplinary team from Monash University has been recognised with the Australian Medical Council (AMC) and Australian & New Zealand Association for Health Professional Educators (ANZAHPE) Interprofessional Education and Collaborative Practice Award for their innovative Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) program.
The AMC and ANZAHPE have a shared commitment to promoting high standards of education and training of the health professions to enable safe, high-quality care. This award recognises the growing importance of interprofessional collaborative practice across the health professions in delivering the best possible care for patients, and the role of interprofessional education in preparing future healthcare practitioners.
The judges felt that all of the submissions were of a very high standard and demonstrated innovative, evidence-informed approaches to interprofessional education and collaborative practice.
The Monash team’s COIL program was commended for its theoretical grounding, stakeholder co-design (including consumers), robust multi-institutional collaboration and design, combining interprofessional and intercultural learning with AI-enabled simulation to prepare students for the realities of modern healthcare. The judges also highlighted the scale and accessibility of the initiative, supported by evaluation data demonstrating high levels of student satisfaction and learning impact.
The COIL program was developed in partnership with Monash University Malaysia, the University of Padua in Italy and the University of Nottingham in the United Kingdom. Between 2023 and 2025, the initiative engaged more than 400 students and 25 educators across seven countries and ten health professions.
“The COIL program responds to the growing need for future health professionals to develop collaborative practice capabilities across professional, cultural and geographic boundaries, while addressing the financial, logistical and equity challenges associated with traditional student mobility programs,” said Zahra Aziz, Senior Lecturer in Public Health & Preventive Medicine, Monash University and lead academic in the project.
One of the strengths of the program is its scalability and accessibility. Designed to be delivered across institutions and borders, COIL brings students from different health professions — and from different countries — into shared virtual learning environments. Through AI-supported simulations and structured collaboration, participants develop the skills required to communicate, problem solve and deliver care as part of diverse teams.
“At first, I was unsure how to contribute outside my medical training, but I quickly realised how much I could learn from others,” said Elizabeth Bell, BMBS Hons Student and COIL program participant. “Nurses offered insights into patient communication and holistic care, while pharmacists emphasised safe medication practices. Through our conversations, I developed a deeper respect for the complementary roles that different professionals play in achieving patient-centred care.”
A central aim of the award is to support early career academics in health professions education.
Amna Mazeh, Educator and Researcher, Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Monash University and early-career academic involved in the project said, “This recognition is a wonderful reminder of why this work matters. “For me, COIL’s greatest outcome has been bringing together students from different health professions and countries to work together across cultural and language barriers, reflecting the reality that health professionals do not work in silos.”
In this inaugural year of the award, we congratulate recipients Zahra Aziz, Amna Mazeh, Barbara Kemp-Harp, Alison Francis-Cracknell and Debra Kiegaldie.
