You're advocating for patients with limited resources. How do you ensure their needs come first?
Healthcare advocates must navigate a complex landscape to prioritize the needs of patients with limited resources. Effective strategies include:
- Partnering with community organizations to tap into a broader resource network.
- Implementing cost-effective care plans that focus on prevention and patient education.
- Leveraging technology, such as telehealth, to increase accessibility for those who cannot easily travel to appointments.
What strategies have you found effective in advocating for patients with limited resources?
You're advocating for patients with limited resources. How do you ensure their needs come first?
Healthcare advocates must navigate a complex landscape to prioritize the needs of patients with limited resources. Effective strategies include:
- Partnering with community organizations to tap into a broader resource network.
- Implementing cost-effective care plans that focus on prevention and patient education.
- Leveraging technology, such as telehealth, to increase accessibility for those who cannot easily travel to appointments.
What strategies have you found effective in advocating for patients with limited resources?
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As a physician and patient (and advocate!), it starts with truly listening to what each patient needs and understanding the barriers they face. Every single person is so different. Also, keep in mind that even if resources are limited, you can focus on what they DO have access to and come up with creative solutions together.
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This question is very apt for a country like India where we see patients in dilemma to chose their hard earned money for lunch and medicines. It is imperative, as healthcare professionals to know when and where to draw the line when it comes to investigative algorithms. It is important for us to not just rely blindly on the reports and to give much attention to clinical medicine and pre-test probability. That way, we can greatly restrict the number of tests required. The other important step is to communicate the need, and more importantly, the urgency of a particular test so that the patient understands the importance of it. A simple question to ask yourself: Am I going to change the treatment with the help of this test's data?
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When a patient has multiple resource needs, I ask them which need they want to be addressed first. There are times that healthcare professionals disagree with the order in which patients want to accomplish their goals, but it’s my job to make sure that their goals and priorities are always respected and at the forefront of any resource search/advocacy/distribution. I want all of my patients to maintain their agency and build self-efficacy, and this is impossible if healthcare professionals dictate what patients’ resource priorities “should” be. Their goals and priorities determine how we, as a team, will need to work together to obtain needed resources.
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As a patient safety advocate, listening, understanding the lived experience, partnering to solve problems and improving public awareness are key. - Listen to the concerns of your patients/clients and acknowledge their experience as valid - understand their needs and priorities - partner with them to explore the available options and support them to implement the strategies that work best for them and their families. - if you can, advocate for system improvements where you recognise a pattern of gaps or faults affecting/burdening your clients.
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- Educating patients about NGOs and various governmental organizations that provide free healthcare campaigns - Encouraging patients to join support associations for specific chronic conditions - Presenting patients with the correct data about current resource to set realistic expectations
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