Emory University Hospital PFAs participating in facility design planning
Advisors are patients and family members who partner with health care professionals to improve health care quality, safety, equity, and experience. Advisors share their insights and perspectives, identify strengths and opportunities for improvement, and collaborate in implementation and evaluation of changes.
If you are just getting started and don’t know where to begin, think of any process or project undergoing review or that is in the planning phase. Invite and prepare patients and families to participate in a work group. If you have an established patient and family advisory council or experience with advisors, continue to search for opportunities to expand their involvement and roles. IPFCC offers resources to guide you on establishing a successful patient and family advisory program.
Below are examples from the field that showcase how organizations are working with patients and families to improve health care.
Emory Healthcare
Dave Hauenstein, PFA, presenting at Winship Cancer Institute’s PFA retreat
PFAs evaluating furniture for new Emory University Hospital Tower
(L to R: Ed Steinman, Hallie Marino, Arielle Alyssa Brown, and Bari-Ellen Ross)
Children’s Specialized Hospital
A goal of the 2024 Family Advisory Council Workgroup at Children’s Specialized Hospital in New Brunswick, NJ, was to create a short video series titled, Confessions of a Caregiver, honest conversations about caregivers’ experiences caring for their loved ones. The Family Advisory Council members drew on their own experience raising their children with special health care needs to share comforting words of wisdom, positive tips that helped them cope during a challenging time, or a positive tip that helped them learn how to embrace their child’s disability. The videos completed include: Strategies to Overcome Challenges; Acceptance of the Journey; and The Balancing Act of Being a Parent. You can view the videos here.
Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center
Cincinnati Children's has developed welcome videos for patients and families who speak languages others than English. Spanish, Arabic, and Nepali are languages most frequently spoken by the patient population served by the hospital. Patient and family partners, who speak Spanish, Arabic, and Nepali, participated in the development of these videos. The above picture is from the filming of the Nepali video.