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Patient Advocates and HIPAA

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Lately I’ve run into questions and discussions about patient advocates or navigators and HIPAA, so it seems a good topic for today’s post. I’ll begin with a disclaimer: there’s no one on this green planet that can give you ALL the answers as they relate to HIPAA! No, not even the lawyers who live it every day. It’s complex and daunting. But there are some basics that might be useful. Here are the basics that can be useful to advocates: 1. It’s HIPAA, not HIPPA. HIPAA stands for the Health Insurance Portability Accountability Act. Notice, it doesn’t say anything about …

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Improving Patient Relationships – What I Told the Providers

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To say my trek to Alaska was overwhelmingly positive wouldn’t begin to touch the real experience. Alaska itself was glaciers, salmon, midnight sun, king crab legs, and learning that in Fairbanks everyone has an extension cord popping out the front of their cars, so they can plug them in during the winter to keep the engine and oil from freezing. Who knew? But the most fulfilling experience was working with the people who attended the workshops I taught. Warm, open, receptive, fun, willing to participate and learn, they were doctors, nurse practitioners, nurses, nurse educators, dieticians, pharmacists, a psychiatrist, front …

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Insurance Reimbursements? Not Exactly a Pot of Gold

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A recent post from a member advocate in our AdvoConnection Forum asked if any of our members have experience with working with self-funded insurance to offer patient advocacy services. Wouldn’t that be a great way to establish a big client, with a pot of money that was ready to be paid to private patient advocates? There were no replies to the question. That doesn’t mean that no one has experience with these reimbursements. It just means that no one replied to the question. BUT – the reasons no one replied may be a version of the following:

And Now a Word for Patients….

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Last week we recognized Private Professional Patient Advocates Week, and across the country, some great stories showed up in newspapers, on TV, online and in radio broadcasts sharing stories of patients and caregivers who have been helped and the advocates who have helped them. Some of the stories, both reviewed last week and over the past few years, are amazing – high end cancer protocols that were never mentioned by physicians, but were brought to patients by their advocates. Complementary therapies, and wellness strategies that patients feel have been useful to them. Thousands of dollars …

Private Professional Patient Advocates Week

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Patient advocates and navigators are my heroes. As such, I am thrilled to announce the first Private Professional Patient Advocates Week (planned to be an annual event) – a week of recognizing the talents and contributions of the several hundred private patient advocates across the US and Canada. “Thrilled” may actually not be strong enough. Over the past couple of years, I have had the privilege of meeting dozens of private advocates – people who are dedicating to smoothing the difficult path through the healthcare system. They lead their charges to improved health, they protect them from medical errors and …

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Patient Advocacy and the Allegiance Factor

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As we prepare for Private Professional Patient Advocates Week next week, I’ve been asked by a handful of people what the difference is between a private patient advocate and any other health advocate. It’s an important question, and the answer is actually quite simple. The difference between a private patient advocate or navigator, and those found in hospitals, through insurance companies, or other places, is what I call The Advocate’s Allegiance Factor. It’s based on who is producing the paycheck. Private patient advocates are paid directly by the patient or the patient’s caregiver and have only one allegiance – to …

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Who Deserves a Patient Advocate’s Help?

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I’ve wrestled with this question more than once. It’s the question raised on occasion by those who talk about universal healthcare, and a for-profit healthcare system. It’s a question asked by those who are concerned that not everyone in the United States has access to healthcare. It’s asked by almost anyone who asks me what I do for a living. The question is, “Doesn’t providing private patient advocacy services only to those who can afford them, just create one more division between the “haves” and the “have nots?” Lots of soul searching, and more than a few conversations have produced …

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