"TakeCHARGE of Your Health Care" Campaign Countdown Continues

WANTAGH, N.Y. - Feb. 25, 2020 - PRLog -- TakeCHARGE of Your Health Care, the new public awareness campaign from Pulse Center for Patient Safety Education & Advocacy (Pulse CPSEA) is ramping up for its official launch.

The campaign encourages people to take "5 Steps to Safer Health Care" from April through August 2020. These five basic actions, says the group, significantly increase a person's chances of getting positive outcomes from medical treatment.

The 5 Steps
1.    Understand and Complete Your Advance Directives (eg. Healthcare proxy)
Why? People are handed a healthcare proxy form upon admission to the hospital and that is too late to decide who will know your wishes.

2.    Keep a Record of Your Medical History and Current Medications
Why? The most common medical error is misdiagnosis and without proper record keeping, mistakes can happen.  Medication side effects can also cause symptoms that clinicians treat instead of considering medication as the cause.

3.    Prepare for Doctor Visits / Make A List of Questions
Why? By preparing and prioritizing questions, people can get better results getting their questions answered.

4.    Prevent Infections / Ask Caregivers to Wash Their Hands
Why? 1 out of 25 hospitalized patients will get an infection.  We all need to expect more from our medical teams who learn the importance of hand-washing early in their careers.

5.    Use an Advocate / Be an Advocate for Others
Why? A supporting person with you on your healthcare journey can help ask questions, take notes, research information and build a larger support system.

Why these steps?

According to Pulse president Ilene Corina, "Each of these steps helps protect against medical error, poor doctor-patient communication, hospital-acquired infections, and other risks that many people don't even know they run when they enter medical care."

"Research has shown," she adds, "that people who are actively engaged as partners with their healthcare teams get better results from their care and run fewer risks of adverse outcomes."

Full details at the TakeCHARGE website  - https://www.takecharge.care

The campaign is paired with a GoFundMe crowdfunding campaign (https://charity.gofundme.com/o/en/campaign/the-takecharge...) raising money to support the campaign.

Website: https://www.takecharge.care

For more information and interviews:

Call: Ilene Corina (President, Pulse CPSEA) at (516) 579-4711 or David Halperin (Pulse CPSEA Communications Director) at (516) 801-6333.