Sometimes, everything old is new again.

Nearly ten years ago, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) moved person-centered care to the top of the list of priorities for the U.S. health care system. Crossing the Quality Chasm identified a patient-centered approach as essential for achieving the quality of care desired by Americans. This important work brought the individuals receiving health and human services into the team as central collaborators in their own care for the first time.

Recently, renewed focus has been placed on person-centered care across the lifespan, through new and emerging models of health care delivery and benefits design such as medical homes, accountable care organizations, and more. “Person-centered,” “patient- centered,” and “client centered” have become common terms, but must be much more than words to have any meaning.

Since 1966, CARF International has been an independent, not-for-profit accreditor of health and human service providers and programs across the lifespan.

CARF International’s mission has long stated, in part, that our accreditation process “enhances the lives of persons served.”

At CARF, we take our mission seriously; and do not view ourselves as accreditors with an audit approach, but as advocates for safe, quality, timely, effective, efficient care, and outcomes that are consistent with the IOM principles on behalf of persons served by the providers and programs we are privileged to accredit worldwide.

CARF accredited providers and programs are recognized as members of an elite international community for their awards and achievements, excellence in outcomes, and a demonstrated commitment to quality and improving the lives of the persons that they serve. A snapshot of some of them, and what they do, will be included in this presentation. In 2009, the CARF family of organizations accredited approximately 45,000 programs at 19,000 locations on five continents, making it one of the largest accrediting bodies in the world. This gives us a unique impact and insight that we will share with the CMSA audience.

Attendees will ultimately learn how “person-centeredness” is at the heart of all our activities around the globe and those of CARF accredited programs and providers. Of additional interest to the CMSA audience, a discussion of the CARF approach to case management accreditation will also be included as part of this presentation.