DNP Final Report: ADVANCE CARE PLANNING: HONORING A PATIENT’S WISHES

Advanced care planning (ACP) and documentation are essential in healthcare to honor patients’ wishes when they can no longer communicate their treatment preferences. There are several barriers to completing ACP conversations and documentation that organizations need to overcome to enhance quality care, reduce emotional and financial burdens, and reduce unnecessary medical interventions. An organization in the Southern U.S. used the Johns Hopkins Evidence-Based Practice (JHEBP) and the Plan-Do-Study-Act (PDSA) models to systematically identify the significance of the problem, search for evidence-based interventions, appraise the level and quality of evidence, select an intervention most feasible and pilot on a small scale, analyze project results, and discuss project implications and sustainability. A structured ACP training program was implemented in a primary care setting to increase the licensed independent practitioners’ knowledge of ACP topics and ACP documentation. ACP knowledge increased by 30% amongst the primary care LIPs, and there was a significant increase in ACP documentation. A post-training questionnaire showed that 85% of the training participants were satisfied or strongly satisfied with the training. The ACP training pilot was successful and will be implemented in other areas of the organization.