What I am hearing out there….

There is so much I want to share about my interactions with so many people in and out of healthcare on this blog…I will try to keep it to one observation at a time!

During the past five years or so, I have been extremely privileged to speak at conferences all over the country. After most presentations, there is a question and answer period (which is always painful to me personally). I wait and pray there will be someone brave enough to ask a question. The moments usually drag on…and, at last, there will be a question. Usually that question is simple – no controversy. But, what never ceases to amaze me is that after these presentations, there is a line a people waiting to ask questions or tell me their personal stories that they weren’t comfortable enough to share publicly. Until recently, the personal stories were usually from clinicians who had been at the sharp end of an adverse event and got no support whatsoever. They still felt horrible about what had happened.

In the last six months to a year, though, there has been a bit of a shift. Now, those personal stories are from clinicians who, as patients or family members, have experienced the “Wall of Silence” when things don’t go right. This is the same “Wall of Silence” that patients and families have been encountered for quite a long time. The emotional pain that they feel is compounded by the fact they feel betrayed “by their own,” so to speak.

We all have to work together to help healthcare figure out how to tear down this Wall and build a Bridge to effective communication and partnership between the patients and families and clinicians. Does anyone have ideas for how we can continue working on this?

Linda

ANOTHER GREAT BLOG...

One of our favorite blogs at MITSS is Paul Levy’s Running a Hospital. In the interests of sharing another great resource (as well as giving ourselves a shameless plug), check out today’s post at www.runningahospital.blogspot.com.

WELCOME TO THE MITSS PATIENT AND FAMILY BLOG

It seems that everyone is jumping onto the bandwagon these days and publishing a blog. One can’t argue with the rationale -- the internet gives a small non-profit, like MITSS, an enormous (and free) reach that we otherwise wouldn’t be able to afford. We didn’t want to blog just for the sake of blogging, though, and decided to take a good look at what we hoped to achieve.Our goal is that the MITSS patient and family blog will serve as a place where open and honest dialogue is encouraged, but respectfully engaged in. We would like to explore the sharing of ideas, personal experiences, and information about when things go wrong in healthcare. We’re hoping that visitors can come away feeling less isolated and alone, armed with some good information, and feeling supported along their journey of healing.

Our most sincere hope, though, is that at its very heart and soul, the MITSS patient and family blog will foster a community of support for patients and family members dealing with medical errors and bad medical outcomes. Lofty goals – we know!!! And, to be totally honest, we’re not sure where this is all going to lead! So, we embark on this journey together. Let us know what’s on your mind, what you’d like to talk about, and what we can do to make this blog better.

With warm regards,
Linda Kenney


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