Writing with a collaborative team

As the science of rehabilitation moves forward, the need to actively participate on a collaborative research team increases. Rehabilitation involves many different disciplines-for example, nursing, medicine, psychology, physical therapy, social work, and epidemiology-that affect the care of persons of all ages with a variety of different clinical needs. Each discipline adds a particular perspective to research questions, clinical situations, and eventually to professional publications. As such, the need for multidisciplinary collaborative research and publication is paramount. Nurses uniquely contribute their theoretical perspectives, use of varied research designs, and their close relationship to clinical practice to collaborative teams. Nurses bring invaluable expertise to the clinical research arena, especially in the areas of health services and implementation research, for which their on-the-ground perspective is invaluable to the overall goal of understanding and improving the system of care to enhance patient outcomes. Nurses benefit greatly by serving as active members on research teams because they come to know more and to be more well known.