The Nurse is the patient Advocate

Sharon Gauthier RN/BSN/MSN/CCMPatient Advocate for You, LLC

Why Everyone Needs an advocate• Nurses are key to patient advocacy because:

• Patient and Family• Develop relationship with patients and families.• Provide holistic assessment and care.• Skilled communicators understanding the patient’s health within in the context of their cultural and personal beliefs.• Role of the nurse is the educate patient to decrease.

• Key player in interdisciplinary team• Speak Up• Do the right thing always!

Patients need a nurse advocate, nurses are key

Current Health Care culture• Decreased staffing : acute and primary care

• A nurse is a nurse is a nurse

• Roles of unlicensed staff increased, as direct contact with patient decreasing

• Complex Patients, multiple health care providers

• Acute Care: Patients more complex, very ill, and decreased length of stay

• Primary Care: Economic crunch of practices, decreased patient visit time, lack of nursing presence

•

Nurses- what we do best

• NURSES are clinical experts in caring for patients with a myriad of diseases, conditions and symptoms

• WE listen to their needs• WE have a sixth sense of what is wrong or what will go wrong• WE are flexible • WE love our job • WE can hold our urine for 15 hours!!

WE ARE THE GLUE OF HEALTHCARE

What is advocacy and who needs us• Definitions

• An RN Patient Advocate coordinates, collaborates and educates on the behalf of the patient and family

• Assessing the need for advocacy• Those who lack knowledge• Those with little power• Those who need to make decisions• Those who receive inadequate care• Those who are unable to communicate for

themselves

Advocacy Goals

Broad Goals and Outcomes of Advocacy• Ensure that clients, families and healthcare professionals are

partners in care• Clients intentionally make educated decisions about the care

they receive, that affect their lives

• Ensure clients understand health issues and treatment options and implementation.

• Support clients in choice for, or refusal of, treatment

• Provide knowledge, understanding and suggestions for alternatives

Communicating with Health Care Professionals

• Demonstrate knowledge and tact • Include information about the client’s

concerns, questions, and expectations • Call the appropriate physician• Encourage direct communication between the

client and the appropriate health care providers

YOU are an advocate

• Change in our health care delivery system is an ongoing process. We are the nurses who need to continue to advocate for our patients. It’s our duty to them and their families.

References:American Nurses association

http://aphablog.com/about-advoconnection/

ALLIANCE FOR PROFESSIONAL ADVOCATEShttp://aphablog.com/about-advoconnection/

http://www.patientadvocateforyou.com

Contact information:Sharon Gauthier RN/BSN/MSN/CGM

30 tower laneAvon, Ct 06001860-703-1575

Hartford-Glastonbury-Stamford

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 2014

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