The Patient Advocate Insider

08/17/2023

08/10/2023

For moments when you notice that you are stressed: Find a quiet spot, tap on your heart and close your eyes. Focus on your heart while breathing in through your nose, then relax deeply on exhale. Repeat nine more times.

07/31/2023

A few tips for those with a loved one scheduled for surgery:

If the procedure will be at at teaching hospital, don't schedule a surgery during the Summer as the new residents arrive in the Summer, and they are unfamiliar with everything. This increases the likelihood of a medical mistake. Why expose your loved one to unnecessary risks?

While scheduling the surgery or during an appointment with the Surgeon, take a nurse aside and ask them if their loved one needed surgery, would they use the same surgeon?

07/24/2023

Your effectiveness as an advocate for your loved one is closely correlated to how much time you spend at their hospital bedside. As their advocate, you will spend between 15-24 hours each day, at their bedside, watching and verifying what goes into them and also what comes out of them. You'll verify that anyone entering their room is following precautions like mask, gloves or sanitizing their hands. A person's hand carry the most germs. Infections are one of the medical mistakes that can happen to your loved one as a hospital patient, and prolong their stay or worse. Its doubtful that a private advocate or an advocate from the hospital would go this far on behalf of your loved one. You are the best person to advocate for your loved one. After taking our course, you'll be the most effective advocate, as well.

07/07/2023

Why I don't recommend advocating for yourself as a hospital Patient.

According to the cptsdfoundation.org, these are distinct disadvantages to self-advocacy:

Lack of perspective to understand the issue at hand. One disadvantage of self-advocacy is that your ability to help yourself is limited by your ability to be objective and clear about the nature of your issues. You may lack objectivity and perspective to make accurate assessments or judgments concerning your own issues. We often deceive ourselves by distorting or denying the truth of what is wrong with our lives because we have developed a catalog of defense mechanisms. We seek to avoid uncomfortable truths and externalize them choosing to blame circumstances or others for our problems. Denial about your problems and using a defense mechanism to avoid facing them makes you unlikely to understand your problems and fix them.

Lack of knowledge. Another disadvantage to self-advocacy is that you may lack the knowledge needed to fix your issues. Even when you are clear on the objective and transparent on the nature of your issues, you might still lack the knowledge of how to fix them. People are not born knowing how to gain and use knowledge to help themselves; it must be taught either in childhood by parents or by adults to themselves. It takes access to resources and a willingness to study those resources before determining what is best for helping yourself. Unfortunately, not everyone is willing to do the necessary footwork.

While this may be true, when advocating for a loved one, the motivation to learn and ability to exercise greater objectivity are increased.

06/23/2023

Below is an illustration from our free ebook entitled:"What Are All these Machines Around My Loved Ones Hospital Bed?" edited by us and authored by Dr. Joanette Claridge-Weisse and Dr. Darren King.

"What is an IV?
An IV is the way your doctor gives you medicine and liquids when you are too sick to take them by mouth. IV is short for “intravenous”. "Intra means inside and venous means veins. When you have an IV, a trained medical person (usually a nurse) will put a tiny plastic tube inside of one of your veins. Your arm is where an IV is usually put. Once the IV is in your vein it is taped in place, so it won't come out accidentally when you move your arm. The IV may be left in your arm for several hours or a few days. How long you have an IV depends on how sick you are and the type of medicine you are getting in the IV."

06/23/2023

Our online course & Support group have gone live and are now available. Check us out at thepatientadvocateinsider.com, and get your free ebook!

05/31/2023

The Patient Advocate Insider is looking for families who have a loved one scheduled for surgery, to Beta Test our course: "How to Advocate Effectively for a Loved One and Get Them Better Care." This online course teaches families how to care for a loved one while in hospital and prevent them from suffering from medical mistakes, and much more. Free of charge. Pre-qualify with us now.

05/29/2023

If you or someone you love is scheduled for surgery in the US and you are concerned about medical mistakes and you also feel overwhelmed by the process, please contact us to see if you qualify to participate in our Beta Test group.

03/30/2023

Just wondering if there is interest in my doing a Facebook live Q & A about advocating for a loved one. Post or pm me.

02/21/2023

Mistakes at the hands of health care providers are a major cause of death in the US. And many of the blunders are a byproduct of the system.