When it comes to navigating the health care system, do you feel up the creek without a paddle? Or In middle of the Pacific without a paddle and there are fins following the canoe?
Well, if you’re in a hospital on your own without
a human angel watching over you, you may feel as though you are at sea alone. So
assemble a care posse to help out if you are going to a hospital. Don’t go in without
family or friends to watch over your care and speak up if you are in la-la-land
or just too sick to speak up yourself.
Take a simple, common problem: Suppose the
controller device that rings for help is beyond the reach of the hospitalized person. A buddy can make sure the controller is
always within reach. A buddy can
also go out to the nurse’s station to ask for help that has not been
forthcoming when the controller buttons have been pressed. And pressed.
A buddy can also make sure the tray table hasn’t
been shoved out of the way and inaccessible. I have seen many people unable to
reach their bedside water supply.
Can you say post-op dehydration?
Medical Patientry 101
Whether
it’s you that's entangled in a complex health care system or a loved one, it’s
important that you learn how to navigate the bumps. But few are taught medical
system literacy. So here are a few of the issues where we need expert coaching:
Asking for a second opinion without offending the doctor; asking the right
questions about diagnosis and treatment; requesting infection-control
procedures before anyone works on you or inserts an IV; double-checking the
dosage and name of meds, understanding consent forms and much more.
There’s
Help: Books
Patient
advocacy is just coming into its own as a life skill. If you want to read up---here
are some options:
The
Empowered Patient: Hundreds of Life-Saving Facts, Action Steps and Strategies
You Need to Know, by Dr. Julia
Hallisy.
YOU:
The Smart Patient…Insider’s Handbook for Getting the Best Treatment, by Michael
Roizen and Mehmet Oz.
More
Help: The Web
Mouse on over to www.everypatientsadvocate.com.
That’s the site for Trisha Torrey, who is also About.com’s expert on patient empowerment.
She offers down-to-earth advice and usable facts---the only kind of fact my
mind will glom onto. (No, I don’t even know when the Battle of 1066 was.) Look
at Trish’s site and check out her article about how to evaluate medical “news”.
In-Person
Help: A Conference
Big doings in San Francisco on the patient empowerment
front: a May 16th conference called Empowered Health Care, keynoted
by Dean Ornish, MD. More info at www.empoweredhealthcon.com.
In
sum---all us medically involved mice quivering before the system should cheer
up. It is possible to be assertive while sporting a bare-bottomed hospital gown.