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Remember Cat’s Cradle? How to Use It to Build Your Advocacy Practice

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Just back at my desk after the last of this Fall’s (2013) three APHA workshops, this one held in Los Angeles – another great experience meeting so many passionate, inspirational advocates and soon-to-be advocates…. As those who took the marketing workshop learned – one of the most important things we should do is to measure the effectiveness and client satisfaction of our work once it’s completed. To accomplish that, after each of the workshops, I surveyed attendees to see what they found most useful and to understand what didn’t work so well, too. The results: The answers varied. Many cited […]

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Is Grampa Packin’ Heat? And Other Safety Considerations for Advocates

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Sometimes a conversation gets started in our APHA Forum that brings me up short. (One reason I SO love the Forum!) One of those conversations was kicked off this week by a member who posed a question: are other members asking potential new clients whether they have guns in their homes? I’m not a gun person, and I live in an area where we just don’t think about guns much, so I really didn’t understand the question at first…. until others chimed in. It’s about safety – which, of course, makes perfect sense. Many members followed up Marie’s question with

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A Surefire Way to Drive Older Clients Away

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OK – so I confess. I talk baby talk to my dog. He’s little, and snuggly, and adorable – and it’s just so easy to call him cutesy names and fall into that simplification of short sentences that we do with babies, too. Just what is it about babies and puppy dogs that begs us to speak baby talk to them. I think that it’s that aura of vulnerability that surrounds them. Vulnerability that begs us to be reassuring or coddling or just drippy-sweet. They clearly need caretaking or caregiving, and we, as their protectors, want to make them feel

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High Tech, Scalability and the Human Role of Health Advocates

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One aspect of healthcare that not enough people understand is about the role of technology for providing medical services: how it should be used, when it should be used, and why it should be used. That disconnect in understanding creates a huge gap in the healthcare continuum that we patient advocates fill – immediately understood, instantly appreciated, and more than worth whatever a client will pay for it. Put simply: tools can’t provide the hugs and reassurance that individuals crave, and need for survival. Consider: There is a huge difference between directly providing care coordination, and using technology to do

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Certified Patient or Health Advocate? Here we Go Again

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Do you consider yourself a Certified Patient Advocate or Certified Health Advocate? I hate to burst bubbles here, but no matter who you are, or what courses or programs you have taken, no matter who or what handed you a certificate at the end, you are not a certified advocate. Why? Because there is no such thing as certification for patient advocates or health advocates. Period. Those of you who have been reading this blog for any length of time have heard this tune – many times – before. Some of you, realizing that you may be doing yourselves and

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And a Great Time, and Some Great Learning, Was Had by All

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My head is still spinning from our Business and Marketing Workshop Experience in Chicago over the weekend. While I’ve already told you how United Airlines tried to ruin the experience for me, I don’t want that to overshadow the real outcome of the weekend; that is, that about 25 of us got together for 1-1/2 days of EXCELLENCE. My measurement of EXCELLENCE comes from attendee comments, but even more so from the things I learned along the way, too. It’s the interaction, the connections, and the shared learning that comprise my definition of excellence. Observations and comments:

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Flying the Not-So-Friendly Skies Can Teach Us All a Lesson

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If I never fly United Airlines again, it will be too soon. They have violated my trust over and over again. And I can’t be the only one. It’s a miracle they stay in business. And as I went into hour #7 of my frustration with them yesterday, I realized that private patient advocates can actually learn from my latest United Odyssey. Here’s the story: I can be found on anywhere from 30 to 50 flights in any given year, depending my speaking engagements and other consulting work. In general, airline customer service really tanked around 2008, except for Jet

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