The Code of Conduct is organized around seven professional pillars: Client Care (prioritizing client wellbeing in every interaction), Honesty and Transparency (accurate representation of credentials, services, and outcomes), Scope of Practice Adherence (staying within trained and credentialed competencies), Confidentiality (protecting client privacy and personal information), Professional Development (ongoing education to maintain and expand competency), Cultural Competency (serving all clients with respect for their backgrounds and beliefs), and Community Standards (upholding the reputation of the holistic health profession broadly).
All practitioners must sign the Code of Conduct as part of their initial credentialing application, and re-sign at every renewal cycle. The signature is not a formality — it is a binding commitment that forms the basis for any ethics or conduct investigation. The full Code of Conduct text is available at iconicboard.health/standards.
Informed consent is a cornerstone of ethical holistic health practice. Before services begin, practitioners must disclose all relevant credentials and explain in plain language what those credentials represent — and, equally importantly, what they do not represent. Clients must understand that an ICONIC Board credential is not a medical license and that holistic health services do not replace medical or psychiatric care.
Additional required disclosures include: any conflicts of interest (financial, personal, or otherwise) that could affect objectivity; the need for medical evaluation when a client presents symptoms that suggest a condition requiring clinical diagnosis; a clear description of the modalities offered and any known contraindications; and full fee structures, cancellation policies, and billing practices before the first session. Disclosure documentation should be retained for a minimum of three years.
The Code of Conduct explicitly prohibits any marketing language that claims diagnostic, treatment, or curative capacity. Practitioners may not write or say that their services can diagnose a condition, treat a disease, or guarantee healing outcomes. This includes indirect claims such as "my clients with autoimmune conditions recover faster" without documented, peer-reviewed evidence and appropriate qualifications in the marketing context.
Additional prohibited practices include: using client testimonials that overstate results or imply typical outcomes; misrepresenting one's credential tier (e.g., presenting a foundation-level credential as equivalent to a doctoral-level one); using the word "licensed" to describe an ICONIC Board credential; claiming specializations not reflected in completed training; and creating marketing materials that could be confused with those of a licensed medical, psychological, or dietary professional. Violations of these marketing rules are among the most commonly investigated Code of Conduct complaints.
Continuing education requirements vary by credential tier but apply to all ICONIC Board credentialed practitioners without exception. At minimum, each renewal cycle requires completion of the specified CE hours (detailed in the Renewal Requirements section of the practitioner portal), with at least one CE hour specifically addressing ethics in holistic health practice. Ethics education must come from an ICONIC Board-approved provider.
For practitioners in their first two years of credentialing, documented supervision or peer consultation is strongly recommended and may be required depending on the modalities practiced. All practitioners are expected to stay current with evidence-informed developments in their specific modalities and to update their practice accordingly. Misrepresenting CE completion status during renewal is treated as a serious Code of Conduct violation and may result in immediate credential suspension pending investigation.
The distinction is important for understanding potential outcomes. Code of Conduct violations involve professional behavior and presentation issues — marketing problems, failure to disclose, insufficient CE completion, or misrepresentation of credentials. These are serious but are often addressed through education, remediation plans, or probation rather than suspension or revocation. They represent departures from professional standards that can typically be corrected with guidance and commitment.
Ethics violations, by contrast, involve direct harm or potential harm to clients — boundary violations, confidentiality breaches, practicing outside scope in ways that endangered a client, or exploitation of the practitioner-client relationship. Ethics violations carry significantly heavier potential consequences including suspension or permanent revocation of credentials. Both types of violations are investigated through the same complaint process, but the Ethics Panel applies different frameworks and weightings when determining outcomes based on the nature of the conduct at issue.