Partnering with Patient and Family Faculty to Share Lived Experiences in an Interprofessional Education Venue: A Call to Action

Seminar Description: The patient and family-engaged care (PFEC) model is considered to be best practice by healthcare policymakers and researchers and supports the Quadruple Aim. This model calls for collaboration between patients and families with healthcare professionals recognizing their critical stakeholder perspectives. The landmark National Academy of Medicine reports, Crossing the Quality Chasm and To Err is Human documented unprecedented medical errors across the US healthcare system and spearheaded the move to PFEC. Since that time, academicians and health policymakers recognized the need to educate current and future healthcare providers on the PFEC service delivery model. PFEC has yet to be systematically implemented in university programs; therefore, recent graduates entering our complex health system may not provide PFEC to their patients and families. Patient and family faculty are patients and/or caregivers of patients who share their lived experiences with healthcare students and professionals. The value of using “patient/family faculty” to share their lived experiences and educate students and professionals on the tenets of PFEC and the benefits of this collaborative partnership has been reported in the literature for over two decades.

This seminar will provide participants with successful strategies for academic partnerships with patients and families to educate health professional students and practitioners. The history and context of this partnership will be embedded throughout the presentation. An interactive discussion with participants regarding guidance and best practices for roles and training needs of patient family faculty (PFF) will be facilitated. Institutional logistics and barriers will be reviewed along with resources for implementing a patient/family faculty program. Specifically, presenters will share their experiences and lessons learned when partnering with patients and family faculty implementing an IPE PFEC education experience. This grant-funded project included 6 academic faculty and their graduate student co-facilitator from different disciplines and engaged 150 students from over 15 healthcare disciplines. In this interactive session, participants will be asked to share their experiences via educational technology applications and delineate best practice principles of storytelling. Participants will have the opportunity to practice sharing their stories and conceptualizing the implementation of a patient/family faculty partnership to align with curricula in their respective settings. Feedback, reflections, and future application of this content will be elicited along with dedicated time for questions.

After attending this session, participants will be able to:
1. Describe the key points of policies that support partnerships and engagement of patient and family faculty with academicians to address the Quadruple Aim.
2. Identify logistical components of successful implementation of patient/family faculty shared lived experiences in the academic milieu.
3. Delineate the roles of a patient/family faculty in an interprofessional education health curriculum.
4. Recognize and listen to patient and family faculty reflections on this partnership along with student perspective.