My Reasons to be an Advocate (and what this blog will be)

When I was a medical student and a practicing physician, I often saw people come to doctor’s appointments (or hospital rooms) with a spouse, relative, caregiver or friend.

Often, this support person would have a binder full of paperwork or a laptop. They kept track of the patient’s medical history, medication lists, notes from other doctors, and sometimes even bills.

As a provider, I was usually very happy to see a support person, especially if they seemed well-organized. I knew the patient would have help answering questions during our time together and that they would have someone to help remember what we talked about later.

As an advocate, I get to be the support person! After a good intake appointment (or several, if shorter meetings are better), I get to know what’s going on in a person’s  medical life - their history, medications, and more. Then I can put it in a format that doctors understand easily - I speak their language too.

During appointments, I can pull up old imaging files, notes from different providers, medication history, and more. When the doctor has all of the information about the patient at their fingertips, they can make the best recommendations possible.

After appointments, I write up a summary of what happened and what needs to happen next. This can be shared with others - like distant relatives or caregivers to make sure everyone who needs to know, does.

Of course, none of that makes for good reading if you aren’t the person involved. And, I wouldn’t be very professional if I shared someone’s private health information with strangers on the internet.

So, this blog will be more about other issues that people reach out to me about. Sometimes, people want me to research something that could apply to everybody. For instance, I spent a few weeks looking into home emergency response systems last year. That’s information that could be helpful for lots of people, not just the one client who hired me to write it.

Although I won’t be sharing anything too private - like client names or unique concerns - I will include a note with each post about the general question(s) I was trying to answer with my writing. Hopefully, you find it helpful!