IPCC Pursues Certification From Planetree

St. Ambrose University Institute for Person-Centered Care (IPCC) has signed a letter of intent to join an elite group of U.S. higher education institutions  to pursue certification from Planetree International, a nonprofit organization started by a patient, for excellence in person-centered care.

Planetree's Person-Centered Care (PCC) Certification® Program certifies higher education organizations that deliver education and training in person-centered approaches to current and future healthcare professionals in person-centered environments.

"The St. Ambrose Institute for Person-Centered Care is dedicated to transforming not only the way we teach and inspire our students, faculty and staff through a Person-Centered lens, but also to growing the evidence through research on Person-Centered Care to shape the way health and behavioral health care services are delivered in the 21st century," said Julie Solomon, IPCC Executive Director. "In almost every other industry, customers are the power brokers for products and services, demanding evolving development. Health and behavioral health care should be no different. There is significant evidence contributing to a shift in the philosophy of health and social service delivery towards person-centered care models. This is framing how health care will be funded, delivered, and evaluated in the coming years. We must contribute to leading this shift at the foundation level through transforming our educational institutions. We look forward to working alongside Planetree and other higher education institutions to accomplish this."

St. Ambrose joins an elite group of like-minded schools in pursuit of Certification. Jill Harrison, PhD, Director of Research, will lead the project at Planetree.

"Since being founded in 1978, it has long been the vision at Planetree that exposure to person-centered care approaches would begin early in the educational journey of healthcare students, providing a common guiding foundation to students across all healthcare disciplines," Harrison said. "The focus on person-centered education not only ensures that students develop competencies in person-centered approaches to care during their training, but also addresses the need for relationship-based partnerships and human-centered design approaches of the broader educational experience and environment for students."

Planetree International is a mission-based, not-for-profit organization that has partnered with more than 800 healthcare organizations in 27 countries to transform how care is delivered.

Powered by over 50,000 focus group attendees comprised of patients, families, and staff – and over 40 years of experience working with healthcare organizations – the Planetree approach emphasizes the quality of human interactions that occur within healthcare settings; the importance of connecting healthcare personnel to the purpose and meaning of their work; and practical strategies for engaging patients and family members as true partners in care. These elements have been consolidated into the Person-Centered Care Certification® Program which provides healthcare organizations with a structured process to guide culture change efforts that yield improvements in clinical, operational, and patient experience outcomes.

Drawing on this experience, Planetree partnered with the National Academy of Medicine in 2017 to introduce an evidence-based Guiding Framework for Patient and Family Engaged Care, using the certification process as a foundation for sustainable improvement.

St. Ambrose University's Institute for Person-Centered Care (IPCC) is dedicated to transforming people, organizations, and systems to deliver care using a multi-disciplinary person-centered approach to care that is: co-designed, relationship-based, health-focused, accessible, and integrated.