Patient Advocacy, Assessment Example

A patient advocate acts as an assistant to the Patient advocate under the office of the Associate Director. He develops and maintains effective interpersonal relationships with all stakeholders in the Health Care System such as the trainees, staff and the management. As a requirement, I have model appropriate and effective communication for the need to modify the communication methods depending on the others’ feedback. During my services, I have received only three complaints regarding my interpersonal effectiveness.

At the Patient Advocate desk, I have assisted in managing contacts in compliance with the established standard work and analyses data in line with my program analyst functions providing the manager with analyzed data quarterly to review the trends in the complaints and departments.

Data Collection and Tracking Support

Being a patient advocate, I have ensured complete entries in the Patient Advocate Tracking System Replacement (PATS-R), which has also tracked more than a hundred contacts. Using PATS-R, I can recognize patterns that the veterans repeatedly identify in a facility, beyond the individual cases. PATS-R streamlines the Veteran Feedback management process and empowers VA staff to “own” their patient customers’ view. The new scheme also prioritizes cases and monitors them. PATS-R helps recognize patterns in concerns that veterans repeatedly identify in a facility or around the country, beyond individual cases.  Tracking and trending patient complaints draw attention to systems or personal performance problems, and through this, it suggests opportunities for quality improvement. This data helps the VA to proactively identify and address the root cause of issues in its facilities. The tool also records compliments to identify workers who represent best practices.

Service Recovery Administration

In resolving the gaps that prevent veterans from seeking assistance for their mental health issues, I coordinate with the available services and build on the service recovery. The patient advocacy has identified the obstacles that hinder the veterans from seeking mental health assistance to worry about adverse employment effects, perceptions that treatment will not be successful and the possibility of lengthy wait times and minimal provider availability.

The Patient Advocate Tracking System (PATS-R) modernizes almost 99% of the process for managing Veteran feedback and empowers the Veteran Affairs to own their patient customer’s experience. Recently the PATS-R deployment team has made an effort to visit all the Veteran Affairs hospitals nationwide to conduct on-site training, ensuring that the Patient Advocates are trained on the new tools. With the help of the new system, which prioritizes and tracks cases, I have identify a trend in repeatedly reported issues in a facility; that information allows the Veteran Authority to proactively find and address the root cause of problems in its facilities. Through the tool, compliments are tracked so that employees who embody best practices are acknowledged; this is as powerful as understanding the gaps in service.

Customer Service

The Veteran Affair is modernizing its customer service delivery to ensure that Veterans have a positive experience at the VA. Through the PATS-R, I have empowered employees to serve the Veterans best, aiming at connecting all the employees allowing every person to serve as a Patient Advocate. Patient advocacy helps teach the patients to carefully choose what kind of questions to ask and how they should like them, such as “what does this medicine to my body and how does it help my medical situation.” Through proper management for the Patient advocate desk in compliance with established standard work for on and off desk duties, under the office of the associate director, I have assisted in coordinating and processing letters thanking staff from patient or family complaints by ensuring all correspondences are professional and free from grammar errors and spelling errors; This has helped to boost proper understanding between the patients and the veterans.

Compliance

In compliance with the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act and other states of the license, I ensure that I’m always updated with the news, thus enabling me to ensure that there is an efficient provision of resources to patients and providers, thus facilitating proper health supply to the patients boosting their safety, which has eventually give more credit to the health care facilities. Also, through the adequate provision of resources, veterans have come up with more improved methods of handling patients, thus further boosting the patients’ safety.

Confidentiality and Security 

Looking at the bigger picture and the whole situation, I have encouraged patients to develop an interest and participate in health screening tools that provide safety, shelter, food, transportation, and disaster relief aiming at improving the environmental conditions for the people, thus enhancing the quality of life for the patients. Also, by focusing on patients whom the patient advocate I am currently working with, I  have been able to build trust with them, making them feel more comfortable, thus enabling me to seek more details about them, which may help the veterans perform their duties. I have  also assisted in coming up with a way of asking open-ended questions and to answers within the conversation by allowing the patients to share stories; this has further boosted proper understanding of the patients’ situation, thus enabling me to seek more appropriate methods to secure their health status.