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The Patient Voice for Compassionate Care: Schwartz Center Dialogues

As part of ongoing efforts to expand its programs beyond caregivers to support and involve patients and families more directly, the Schwartz Center has designed a unique new patient-centered initiative. The Patient Voice for Compassionate Care: Schwartz Center Dialogues will bring the experiences and perspectives of patients and their families directly to caregivers in a series of facilitated discussions. The program aims to help patients and their families become stronger advocates and partners in their own care; at the same time, its purpose is to improve the communication skills of caregivers and the quality of compassionate care they deliver. The panel of patients and caregivers will identify specific changes necessary to improve communication and will reconvene over time to ensure that the changes are made and the patient focus sustained. The Schwartz Center selected three pilot sites for this program: Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center Healthcare Associates in Boston, a primary care practice; Family Health Center of Worcester, a community health center, and the Cancer Center at Yale New-Haven Hospital in Connecticut. Patient and caregiver panels started meeting this year. If the pilots are successful, the Schwartz Center will disseminate the information learned in order to make a greater impact throughout the health care system and will replicate the Patient Voice at additional sites in the coming years.

For more information, contact Marjorie Stanzler.