A patient advocate could be just the thing to make you feel better

ANCRAMDALE — When you’re not feeling your best, when you’re ill and overwhelmed, it sometimes helps to have someone in your corner to help fight your battles and support you when you need it most. That’s what having a patient advocate is all about, according to Marietta Whittlesey.

Whittlesey is a patient advocate with a new business based out of Ancramdale serving a 200-mile radius. She started her business, New England Patient Resources, at the end of 2009, after working in the health-care field for many years in various capacities.

“It was really a growing profession, and because it was something I’ve done for free, I started thinking, ‘How can I make it into a business?’â€

Whittlesey has a master’s degree in clinical psychology and has been a ghost writer for medical journals for years, so she has “good medical knowledge and spent a lot of time around doctors,†she said. She also volunteered with the ambulance squad in nearby Salisbury, Conn., for eight years.

When asked to define exactly what a patient advocate does, Whittlesey said it can be “broadly defined,†but proceeded to condense the description as best she could.

“What I do specifically is first of all help as liaison between physicians and patients,†she said. “Very often patients, particularly when they’ve gotten a bad diagnosis, are afraid to ask questions, and come out of the office very upset and confused, so medical translation is a big thing that I do.â€

Another job for patient advocates is to sort through all of the information patients give to doctors that might be extraneous. They help doctors and medical professionals get to the relevant information immediately — information that could be vital in making a diagnosis, recommending a course of treatment or discovering a cure.

“It’s frustrating for the doctors not to get the right information up front and it compromises the medical care, I think,†Whittlesey said. “And patients so often don’t understand the kind of information doctors need to get from them.

“That leads me to another thing we’re doing; by 2014 America is supposed to be doing electronic records, but nobody thinks we’ll make it,†she added. “So people are having me put their medical records on flash drives and I keep their records in secure locations. That way when they have to have imaging and tests done they don‘t have to have things repeated, which can be costly. They can arrive at appointments with their lab studies that have been done before; I can have those things printed out.â€

Other duties a patient advocate can handle include arranging for second and third opinions when a patient is diagnosed; explaining a diagnosis and helping to research treatment options; researching clinical trials; sorting out Medicare, disability and billing issues; and providing caregivers relief with qualified health-care workers (there’s even an option to hire a masseuse and manicurist for homebound patients). Whittlesey also specializes in dealing with dermatologists after co-authoring a book on the subject.

“I provide information and referrals and post-op services as needed for people contemplating undergoing cosmetic surgery or cosmetic dermatologic procedures ranging from peels to various types of lasers to facelifts,†she explained. “I have a huge array of doctors in that field [whom I can work with].â€

Some of the standard questions asked about the practice of hiring a patient advocate include whether insurance covers the cost. The answer is not yet, but there are a lot of professional services for patient advocates that are working very hard on changing that, according to Whittlesey.

People also want to know how doctors feel about patient advocates.

“Ninety percent of the time doctors are very happy we’re there,†she said. “We’re not there to challenge doctors or argue with doctors. We’re there to translate and facilitate, and doctors are generally very happy to have somebody there who speaks their language. I’ve never really had any issue with doctors and usually have doctors say to clients of mine they were so happy they hired us.â€

Does hiring an advocate add a layer of bureaucracy and cost?

“Yes, it does add a little layer of cost, but the whole idea is that I make things much easier for the patient because they don’t have to deal with all that paperwork and the hope is that I reduce the bureaucracy for people,†Whittlesey said. “It really lightens the load. If you’re sick, and in the hospital — hospitals work in their own mysterious ways and plus you’re not feeling well and are very anxious because you’re ill — to have somebody holding your hand can be very reassuring.â€

And it’s not just a sales pitch for Whittlesey; she truly believes in the benefits of having a patient advocate stand by and support you when you’re going through with any medical treatments.

“I’m having a procedure around Thanksgiving and I’m hiring a friend who is a health-care advocate to help me,†she said, adding it will take the worry away from the stress of going to the hospital and let her focus on getting through her procedure glitch-free.

To learn more about patient advocates, and Whittlesey’s business, log on to newenglandpatientresources.net or call 518-398-0051.