Christie VanHorne joins me to discuss health literacy and how to improve communications between patients and providers.
Christie is the CEO of CVH Consulting, a public health consulting firm that provides training and educational services to improve learning outcomes. In early 2020, Christie founded How to Talk to Your Doctor, a project devoted to educating and empowering patients and front-line healthcare professionals on how to improve the patient-provider relationship through improving communication skills and health literacy.
Highlights include:
10:44 – CVH: “With an audience of women, is it pain? Do we see pain as a normal part of our lives? And if you ask this question to people without knowing what I’m going to say next, they’re typically like, no, but when we talk about women’s health, it is intrinsically a part of our lives.”
16:02 – CVH: “We have to start seeing ourselves as our best experts and we have to start seeing medical care as a partnership. So these are the two things I think can really change everything in healthcare and the way that we look at the way we receive care.”
19:05 – CVH: “So if you’re at a doctor and you don’t feel like they’re listening to you and you just get an off feeling, seek a second opinion. And that right there, if you know that your insurance will cover – I always encourage, of course, to call your insurance – but just knowing that little bit of information could make such a huge difference in your care.”
23:20 – CVH: “I also have workshops for healthcare professionals. So my target audience there is really the frontline staff. I’ve had nurses in my trainings. I’ve had community health workers, social workers, health educators. And what I talk about with them is really this – I see it as bridging a gap. Because, say you’re a community health worker and your focus is diabetes. You educate the people that you’re working with about diabetes, of course, and give them the tools and ways to manage their chronic illness. But where I see a gap is okay, they know about their illness, but what happens when they go to the doctor and they don’t know that they can ask certain questions or they’re not prepared for that appointment?”
Leading with Health is hosted by Jennifer Michelle. Jennifer has a Master’s in Public Health and Epidemiology and is a former EMT. As President of Michelle Marketing Strategies, Jennifer specializes in healthcare marketing. She is on a mission to create a healthcare system that actually cares about the patients and the providers.