advocacy ethics – APHA Blog : The Alliance of Professional Health Advocates

Less Becomes More: Where Subtraction Has Positive Results

I spent the weekend gardening. It’s spring, after all.

Since my last assault on my garden last Fall, many plants got leggy, or died, or just needed rehab of some sort. Unlike many of my neighbors (and maybe you, too!) what I love most about gardening is finishing it. It feels so good when it stops! 🙂

What was unique about my weekend gardening is an observation I made; a good metaphor to share with you, in hopes of providing some inspiration on a service you can provide to your clients. (Yes, this is what happens when I’m pulling weeds. I get thinking about other, more important things!)

No – I don’t expect you to do your clients’ gardening! But follow along with me and it will make sense.

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20
MAY

advocacy business, advocacy ethics, advocate marketing, client services, common sense, decision making, patient advocacy, patients

Simon and Garfunkel – an Anthem to Advocacy

Posted by: Trisha Torrey

OK, yes, I’m dating myself… One of my favorite Simon and Garfunkel songs is Bridge Over Troubled Water. I’ve been humming it repeatedly over the last few weeks, and last week, we let the advocacy world know why.

When you’re down and out
When you’re on the street
When evening falls so hard
I will comfort you (ooo)
I’ll take your part, oh, when darkness comes
And pain is all around
Like a bridge over troubled water
I will lay me down
Like a bridge over troubled water
I will lay me down

The lyrics – are like an anthem about advocacy, aren’t they? The idea that one person can help another person by creating a bridge over the problems, to make the path to the other side smoother. It’s the work advocates do every day, proudly, passionately, and most often with incredibly positive results.

Beyond the lyrics, the metaphorical bridge goes even further, which is what has prompted the song to run through my head most recently.

So – what happened last week?

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29
APR

advocacy business, advocacy certification, advocacy ethics, advocate education, allegiance, client services, common sense, health advocates and navigators, media, patient advocacy, professional standards

ICOPA

Johnny Carson, Game Shows, and a Lesson about Trust

Posted by: Trisha Torrey

Back in the 1950s, into the 1960s, a game show called Who Do You Trust? aired where couples were asked questions, and one had to “trust” the other to answer it (or not!). If you remember the show (some of us do) you may also remember that Edgar Bergen (yes, Candace Bergen’s father) was the MC for the show.

However, what you may not remember is that a year or two into the show, Bergen was replaced by Johnny Carson – who often “helped” the couples get the right answers. He helped them – well – TRUST.

The irony of this particular game show, one with TRUST in the title, is that it aired during the years of the game show scandals – yes – scandals! The game show scandals were all about cheating, and giving answers to pre-determined winners, and money changing hands in ways it shouldn’t.

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18
FEB

advocacy ethics, allegiance, caregivers, client services, common sense, health advocates and navigators, patient advocacy, professional standards

The Momma Test

Posted by: Trisha Torrey

Over the years, one of my favorite things to do has been to work with / speak to / address college students. They are young, aren’t yet set in their ways, still hope to save the world, are naive to the “follow the money” aspects of healthcare and, honestly, it’s just plain fun.

Last week I had the privilege of participating in an ethics debate for a well-known and respected university in a course called Controversies in Healthcare (medical, legal, and bio ethics), to a combination group of law students and medical students, on the topic of independent advocacy – vs – hospital advocacy. My co-debater was the Director of Ombudsman at a very well-known and respected hospital system.

The idea, since it was a “controversies” class, was that we were supposed to argue that our own solutions were the better solutions, and that the opposing solution was not a good choice.

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4
FEB

advocacy ethics, advocate best practices, advocate marketing tools, client services, common sense, decision making, empathy, hospital patient advocates, hospitalized patients, money, patient advocacy, patient safety, patients

Loaded for Bear May Mean No Care

Posted by: Trisha Torrey

Last week, I received an email from a woman, I’ll call her Miranda, taking me to task for an article I had written that she found online. If Miranda had her way, I’d be walking the plank about now, or on my way to life in prison.

The article she found is about patient modesty and how it affects one’s ability to get medical care. It poses the problem, considers the roots of the situation, then offers ideas to help someone get beyond modesty hurdles in order to benefit from better medical care.

Oh, but Miranda was not happy about that article! She graced my email inbox with a missive (out of curiosity I pasted it into a word document to see how many printed pages it would be – about 5!), as if she was the prosecutor outlining all the reasons I should get life in prison, taking me to task because I had not taken into account survivors of sexual abuse. Further, the fact that I used a car as a metaphor offended her because people aren’t cars! (She’s right. They aren’t. I didn’t say they were. I used cars as a metaphor.) She expected me to rewrite and republish the article, and she wanted a “public apology” for being so callous and ignoring the plight of sexual abuse survivors.

Wow!

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21
JAN

advocacy business, advocacy ethics, advocate bad practices, client services, common sense, decision making, health advocates and navigators, patient advocacy