Hi,
I have been a licensed athletic trainer for 20 years and I have been asked to comment on this blog as a health care worker. As an athletic trainer it is my responsibility to manage and coordinate the care for injured athletes and work with healthy athletes to prevent injury and illness. Athletic training is an allied health profession that often works with primary care physicians as a physician extender.
As a physician extender, athletic trainers work under a licensed physician to help treat and educate patients who are in the "active population." For example, if a patient has an overuse injury from starting a new running program, the physician may ask me to teach the patient some exercises to alleviate the pain. He may also ask me to educate the patient on how the injury developed and how to prevent it in the future. This care model has many benefits.
One such benefit is the quality of service provided to the patient. Often, the patient spends very little time with the physician and is just given orders by the physician. These orders are sometimes confusing the patient and often leads to non-compliance. When an athletic trainer takes the time to discuss the treatment plan with the patient, not only do they better understand why a treatment is needed, but they are more likely to adhere to the care plan.
The second benefit is cost. If this same service were provided by the physician it would cost a lot more money. As you can imagine, it doesn't cost nearly as much to compensate an athletic trainer for 30 minutes as it does a physician.
The final benefit is access. By having an athletic trainer assist a physician with his duties, it allows the physician to increase his patient volume without harming the quality of care.
Thank you for giving me the opportunity to discuss the importance of my profession in the inpatient care model.
Denise, Licensed Athletic Trainer
I think patient education is so important. Many times patients are non-compliant because they simply don't understand the doctors orders. Having someone like an athletic trainer is very beneficial for additional support to the patient.
ReplyDeleteI think Denice make a great argument not only for Athletic Trainers, but for many of the allied health professions. It is often easy to forget the important role played by the "other" professionals within the health care arena, yet so often these individuals are underutilized. Sounds like the health care system should start hiring some new Community Health Education graduates pronto! :)
ReplyDeleteMindy's comment is very true. Patients many times are non-compliant because they don't understand. Not only that, as we have learned, patients may be intimidated by doctors. They don't feel like asking questions as to seem unintelligent.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Mindy as well that education is very important in understanding why doctors make the orders they do. Also, the benefits of seeing other types of health care providers offers a different perspective. This can help patients gain a better understanding as well as different opinions which can better equip them for their decisions.
ReplyDeleteMindy is right. Patient complience is a huge part of recovery. I think many times patients do not understand the instructions the doctor is giving them or do not realize the repercussions of missing just one dose of medication or one round of rehab. Have allied health professionals assist in the education process is a plus.
ReplyDeleteI just recently attended a speaker at Gundersen Luthern that talked about the importance of health literary called Health-e People. I couldn't agree more, health literacy can be a problem at any education level. Just because you can read well doesn't mean that you can understand and act on health information. Patients will have a higher recovery rate with more information and a better understand of their treatment and their health issues.
ReplyDeleteI think it's interesting to see, once again, how important prevention is. Also, when there has been a lack of prevention, how much education can help prevent an injury (or illness) from happening again. After getting all these perspectives from individuals who are already in the health care field really reiterates how important it is to take preventative measures.
ReplyDeleteThank you for authoring on this blog. I appreciate your thoughts about improving health care and hope you will comment on other postings in this blog or other blogs about health care.
ReplyDelete