A friend of mine sat with her extended family outside the ICU where her loved one was fighting for her life. Over the next few days, one particular doctor said and did things that were distinctly "un-healing" for the family.
The patient died. After the funeral, my friend was torn: She didn't want to cause any problems, but she felt an obligation to do something.
A few days later, she received a call at home from the hospital CMO. He expressed gratitude for her letter and reassured her the problem would be addressed.
As a Healthy Survivor, don't do anything that jeopardizes your (or your loved one's) care. If you feel the need to write a letter of grievance to someone in charge, take precautions to ensure that what you submit is a healing letter.
I understand the need not to jeopardize care and an obligation to be polite and healing yourself. But it makes me angry that the family had to endure the behavior of a particular doctor while intimidated from complaining, however politely, to that doctor or his/her superiors while the behavior was occurring for fear of jeopardizing care. We have all been in that situation. Is there no remedy that will cure the problem while it is causing the family suffering?
Posted by: Roz | October 09, 2009 at 09:13 AM
I want to root for writing letters of grievance, or for making your grievances known in other ways too such as verbally.
Wendy, when you write the term "healing letter" I'm not entirely sure what that phrase means.
I am a big advocate of aggressive letter writing, that boarders on threatening. Yes, threatening. That word has such a negative connotation, but the gist of it in this situation is "something is wrong with my care in your hospital and if it does not change, there will be consequences."
I do not know that I would write a threatening letter in response to an insensitive comment made by a doctor, but there are myriad other situations in which I have posed verbal and written dissatisfaction, stressed the immediacy of the situation, the changes I wanted to see happen, and set forth a timeline in which I expected the change to occur, and most importantly told them what the consequences would be if they did not take the action I wanted them to. I in no way have ever felt I am jeopardizing my care by sending these carefully worded, thoughtful, and biting letters. In fact, this is when I see my care improve. This is when I am taken seriously as a patient and everyone from orderlies to admins and CMO's to CEO's start bending backwards to give me the care I deserve. And, more than once, they assume I'm a lawyer. (This one always makes me laugh, but you'd be amazed what it does for the level of service you are provided.)
I do applaud your friend for writing this letter. It is so hard to respond to an after-the-fact, wrong doing situation when we are in the tangle of treatment or in the midst of the grieving process. In fact, I believe that many hospital systems count on the fact that we are too busy or in too much physical or psychological pain to respond to such situations.
Best,
Kairol
http://everythingchangesbook.com/
Posted by: Kairol Rosenthal | October 09, 2009 at 09:58 AM
Dear Roz and Kairol,
In HAPPINESS IN A STORM, I share my take on dealing with problems with individuals and with the healthcare system. The bottom line for me is finding the best way for you to get the best care for you. Sometimes it involves choosing your battles.
As for "healing letters," I mean correspondence that opens the door to meaningful, respectful and efficacious conversation.
There are many ways to criticize or bring problems to the attention of people in charge. As a physician-survivor, I believe one of the great obstacles to better care is poor communication. Until we value the time it takes to communicate with expertise and compassion, we're going to lose opportunities for healing. With hope, Wendy
Posted by: Wendy S. Harpham, MD | October 09, 2009 at 10:51 AM