Patient Advocacy: How to Advocate for Yourself in the Healthcare Setting
Getting good healthcare these days is no joke.
As a PT and health coach, I find the best care for patients comes when we keep one foot in both the western medical world and the eastern/alternative/holistic world. We get different things from each of them and they both play a unique and important role in the healing process. Navigating providers, referrals to specialists and creating a robust team around patients is one of the parts of my job that I love and also didn't know I would be doing so much of!
BUT... healthcare offices, both western and naturopathic/holistic are often overloaded with too many patients and not enough providers and insurances are continuing to cut back on what they cover and how much they pay for services.
So, this blog post is all about how to be the driver of your care in order to advocate for yourself and ultimately get the best outcomes. It can be really frustrating to wait weeks to months to get an appointment, be seen for 15 minutes or less and be sent out the door with some meds, a bill and maybe some testing if you're lucky. It can leave you feeling defeated and dismissed.
I’ve broken this process down into 3 distinct time frames, pre, during and post visit and given some practical tools for each of these phases to help you maximize your outcomes and results!
First: Preparing For Your Visit.
Write down your questions, concerns and requests on paper and bring that list to your appointment.
Track your symptoms over several weeks or months and bring that data with you.
Do your own research on your symptoms and bring in any articles or evidence you think might be relevant or guide your desired treatment plan.
The way our current healthcare system is set up you might find yourself waiting months for an appointment with your doctor or specialist.
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The most important parts of prepping for your visit is writing your questions down, tracking your symptoms and doing some pre-research. This will help you feel prepared and empowered that your symptoms are both real & disrupting to your life and that there are options out there for testing and treatment that your doctor can work with you to pursue.
Second: Within Visit Assertiveness
Arrive early and review your list of questions in the waiting room so you don’t forget to ask any of them.
Reference your list or evidence during the appointment so your provider knows you have certain topics you’d like to cover.
Use assertive language such as ‘I would like to have my lab values drawn’, ‘this symptom is concerning to me and I would like to address it from a root cause perspective’ and ‘who can you refer me to who can help me get to the bottom of this’
In PT school we're taught how to communicate with physicians quickly and efficiently through the acronym SBAR, which stand for situation, background, assessment, recommendation.
In all fairness, they are busy people! The insurance world does not make it easy on clinicians and they often want to provide the best care but the limitations and restrictions of clinical practice make that challenging. Speaking their language a little can help get you communicate your needs and speed along the process.
For example, an SBAR communication might look like this:
Situation: My periods are becoming more irregular and it is concerning to me.
Background: For most of my life they were consistently coming every 30 days but over the past six months they have been coming at irregular intervals between 2 and 6 weeks apart. I am also having worse symptoms including headaches, heavy bleeding and and painful cramps
Assessment: I think my hormone levels are off and I would like to get them tested.
Recommendation: I read from a reputable source that we should test several times throughout the month. I'm hoping we can order a couple rounds of blood work for next month and I would like a referral to an XYZ (specialist, naturopath, acupuncturist, dietician etc)
We have to approach our symptoms with the same urgency and concern as we expect our providers to. They aren’t living in your body and can’t understand how much something is impacting your quality of life unless you tell them.
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Using assertive language and conveying your message in a clear, concise manner will help them understand your concern and work with you to develop a plan.
Third: Post-visit Follow Up
Before you leave, ask your doctor to reiterate their plan and when your next follow up appointment should be.
Check your health portal and read the visit summary to make sure labs and referrals you requested have been submitted, sometimes their notes will also have a more clear outline of what they’re thinking
Call and ask to speak to a member of your doctor’s team if you have any follow up questions or concerns. Their nurse typically has the most direct line to them and can get answers relatively quickly.
If you aren’t responding how you think you should after a few weeks or months to a medication or treatment plan, reach out and let them know before your next follow up, they may want to do something different sooner.
Seek a second opinion if you aren’t happy with your current team or plan. Ultimately you are the boss of your healthcare and your team works for you. However, the power dynamics can easily get shifted making you feel like you have no choice but to do what they say. This isn’t true. You have options and should exercise that authority and autonomy
Following up and keeping a close relationship with your doctor is crucial for making sure you get the best care. Remember they’re human too and are expected to see a lot of people everyday, the squeaky wheel truly gets the grease.
Ok, after this blog I hope you can see that I am ALL FOR working within the system we have and using strategies to make it work for us the best it can. I think it's super important to have a good, healthy, long-lasting relationship with a health care provider.
However, sometimes enough is enough. Sometimes we have to move on in order to get the care we need. If we are consistently not having our needs or desires listened to, if we are only being offered options we have made clear we aren't interested in, or if it feels like our symptoms are routinely being ignored or dismissed, it's your RIGHT to seek help elsewhere.
Aviva Romm is a super woman and force for good in the women’s health world. She has a couple really good podcasts on this topic and I’ve linked them below incase you are interested in listening.
So go girl! I hope you found this blog post helpful and are able to use some of the tips and strategies to get the best care you can.
On Health Podcast - How Being a 'Good Girl' is Hazardous to your Health
