The health care system has become a maze of complicated red tape. Accessing care since the beginning of the Covid Pandemic has made things even more difficult.
The nursing specialty of patient advocacy has never been more relevant. What is a patient advocate? First a patient advocate does not need to be a nurse. To become a Board-Certified Patient Advocate you must apply. Based on your experience in assisting patients in the health care arena you may be a social worker, or a nurse or other health care professional that may decide to sit for the exam. If your application is accepted, you may register for the exam. We at Your Nurse Advocate Consulting are board-certified in patient advocacy. Our nurses that will work with our clients will be Board Certified Patient Advocates.
Patient advocacy assists their clients in making informed health care decisions by empowering them with the information needed to take the correct action which is right for them. We do not make decisions for you. We help you get the information you need to make your own decisions. We can assist you in getting the answers you need. We will collaborate with your health care professionals and work with them to create the intended outcomes.
Common questions we hear include:
“When is the right time for Hospice?” “My parent needs help in the home and I work full-time, what do I do?” “I don’t understand how I can manage my Congestive Heart Failure better?” “I don’t understand which medications I am suppose to take, I have so many doctors”. These questions are just a small sample of what we can assist you with.
A patient advocate can provide several types of services ranging from reviewing medical bills to building a plan of care to keep an elderly family member safe at home for as long as possible. For more specific information click here for our brochure. (YourNurseTrifoldDone.pdf)
According to the book by Trisha Torre entitled The Health Advocate’s Start and Grow Your Own Practice Handbook, she discusses many reasons why someone would need a health, patient or nurse advocate.
1. Aging Baby Boomers: Nearly 79 million Americans are counted as baby boomers, born between 1946-1964. Baby Boomers are living longer and will aging comes more diseases such as diabetes and heart disease.
2. A sub group of the Baby Boomers are the “elder orphans”. This group of seniors do not have any help in making their health care decisions. This creates a need for a health advocate to help them navigate the system and make informed decisions.
3. People are living longer and so are living longer with chronic diseases that need to be managed.
4. Our mobile society: Where are the kids? Today with all the technology people can work and live anywhere. It is so common now for adult children to live across the country from their aging parents and with
families of their own it makes it very difficult to assist their mom and dad. It could be months or years since they were last home to see their folks. There is often a tremendous amount of guilt associated with these children of aging parents. This is where an advocate can step in and help the entire family cope with managing health care decisions and even assist in mediation with the family to decide what roles each family member can play.
5. Adult children living close to their parents often are caught up in work as well as their own families and time is very limited. An advocate can step in here as well so it is not just for adult children living away from home.
6. According to the American Medical Association, there will be a shortage of about 160,000 physicians; primary care and specialists by 2025. Who can help them get their appointments and the care that they need? A patient or health advocate.
7. With an abundance of information available, consumers are becoming more educated with all the online resources at hand. The more knowledge gained the more consumers have questions. Who can help them sort out all the information and how it pertains to them? A patient or health advocate.
8. Health Care Reform and Re-designed Care Delivery. Whether it is Obama Care, Trump Care, Biden Care or some other type of health care reform we know one thing for certain. It will keep changing. Your Nurse Advocate Consulting team can assist you in staying on top of the changes and how they affect you.
9. Follow the Money: Most people don’t understand that the care they receive is first, and foremost, dependent on how the system will be paid for that care. A CEO with a “golden” health insurance plan is getting far more attention and better care than someone on Medicaid and has a mental health
concern that needs to be addressed.
10. A patient advocate can help sort out tests and procedures and make sure everyone understands what is required to treat them. What happens if your insurance doesn’t cover something? An advocate can help with that.
11. Who is most apt and prepared to help you from making a mistake or finding a mistake whether it is related to your bill or a medication? Once again, a patient advocate can help!
How does a patient advocate get paid? Most advocacy services are private pay. Cost depends on the types of services required. Reviewing a medical bill takes a lot less time than putting a plan together to keep your elder parents safe at home. We provide a free 15-minute consultation to determine your needs and to see if there is a good fit for our services. Depending on what you need assistance with, we will put together a quote with an estimated amount of time it will take to complete. We having different levels or tiers of
services depending on how much of the work you would like to complete on your own. In our lowest cost tier, we provide you with the resources needed, some recommendations on how you can achieve the intended goal and you put the plan together. Tier 2 combines your work and our work. A blend of DIY for some of the items and we complete some other tasks needed for the plan. The final of our 3 tiers of service is a full-service plan where we design and implement the plan for the intended outcome.
You can expect educational offerings that can help you manage diseases such as COPD, Heart Disease, Congestive Heart Failure, Diabetes and more.
Your Nurse Advocate Consulting will empower you to become informed in making your own health care decisions or the decisions of your loved one. As R.N.s we feel you will not only receive the benefits of having a health advocate but have the added advantage of all the skills that only many years of nursing experience and patient care can offer.
We are here to serve you and make the complicated simple as you navigate through the complex maze of our health care system.
Thanks for stopping by and learning more about our services.
Pam and Linda
Your Nurse Advocates
