The patient-centered care model is the future of healthcare. More professionals in the field recognize the importance of considering patient’s individuality, and not just names of diseases and registration numbers. Involving patients in decision-making and treatment is vital because patients desire and deserve a more hands-on and collaborative approach to their care.
While patient-centered care is just now making its way into the mainstream, the concept of providing care that is respectful, holistic, and engaged has been at the core of integrative care for many years.
As the field moves toward predominantly patient-centered models, embracing a more integrative approach is a natural evolution. Let’s explore the basics of patient-centered care and why integrative life is so well-suited to this treatment philosophy.
What is Patient-Centered Care?
Patient-centered care is an approach to treatment that sets the patient, their goals, and their opinions as the core of the care model.
Rather than a traditional, prescriptive — and often authoritarian — relationship, in patient-centered care the patient helps determine the agenda. The practitioner sets the environment where the patient has greater freedom of expression without the usual time constraints of the current model.
They share their goals and their individual definition of health and happiness with the provider. From there, provider and patient work together as a team, which may include significant others as well as medical specialists and healthare professionals to help the patient reach their vision of success.
Patient-centered care restores the patient’s agency in their own health and wellness. Instead of being reduced to a case file moving from one specialist to the next (and who often don’t share notes), the patient is included as an integral part of the care team.
In the next blog, we outline the four ways that Integrative Care perfectly aligns with the new patient-centered care model.
Health care practitioners can broaden their practice and their value to their patients with an Integrative Care approach. Contact Dr. Merizalde about his Executive Coaching and Mentoring programs.
