I consider myself a fairly calm person. With most people, I’m able to communicate easily and with a positive attitude and humor. However, lately, I’ve expressed a different side of myself. It all started with my mother’s sudden and unexpected visit to the emergency room ten days ago.
When I look at the cause of my frustration, I see a very clear trigger that is alarmingly starting to become a pattern: an utter lack of 
communication by healthcare “professionals” – EVERYWHERE!
Here are some specific examples from a long chain of connected events:
- Communication between hospital and EMTs: Nurses at the hospital didn’t inform the EMTs about anything regarding my mother and which body parts should and should not be attended to during transfer.
- Communication between EMTs and Skilled Nursing Facility (SNF): The EMTs then gave minimal information to the nurses at the Skilled Nursing Facility (SNF). And naturally, the nurses didn’t ask for any information beyond whatever paperwork they received.
- Communication between SNF and Assisted Living (AL): Although the SNF and the Assisted Living community are housed within in the same building, they displayed a complete lack of communication between each other!
- For example, at 11am on a Thursday morning, my mother and I were told by FOUR different staffers it was okay for my mom to move back to her regular AL unit. So we moved. At 5 pm that evening the Director of Nursing (DON) told us we had to move back to SNF. What? We had moved six hours ago, so we weren’t going anywhere. A second DON told us the same thing, but we again refused. It was utterly frustrating to be told many different things by many different staffers.
- Communication between one staff shift to the next: Each staff shift treated my mother differently and didn’t communicate anything about her care to the next shift.
- For example, on Sunday, my mom asked two different nurses to check and make sure her medical waste bag was draining properly. They each said it was fine. However, the graveyard shift nurse didn’t know, freaked out, and called 911. My mother was carted off to the emergency room at 11pm that night only to be told her bag was fine. She didn’t return home until 5 am the next morning. Such escapades are not easy for an elderly person to recuperate from – especially when she is already sick and weak.
Time and again and again I was expecting one thing when blindsided by another. I simply did not know who to trust or what was going to happen next. My recent experience was extremely frustrating, to say the least, which was heightened by simply not knowing what to do. Now, if I was feeling imprisoned by an impersonal healthcare system, image how my mother, the patient, was feeling?
Remember: Clear communication clarifies expectations that lead to satisfied and happy patients and customers. And when patients are happy, they follow their treatment plans and HEAL much faster. Now that’s hot!
What do YOU do to ensure your team delivers consistent communication and follow-up? I’d love to hear your ideas in the comments section below.