Once again, a team of AMWA members will be blogging and tweeting about the annual conference. If you are interested in being part of the team, please send an e-mail to me at VictoriaJWhite@gmail.com. No blogging experience required. Scroll through the 2009 conference blog below to get an idea of what we have in mind. Audio, video, and photos would be a welcomed addition to the blog.
--Victoria White
This blog is devoted to news about the AMWA Annual Conference.
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Missed the keynote speech? Listen online
Missed the inspiring keynote speech from Karen Woolley at this year's AMWA conference? You can now hear it online. This is a resource available for AMWA members only. Follow the link from AMWA's home page.
Read our posts about the speech here, here, and here.
Read our posts about the speech here, here, and here.
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Success Stories in Health Literacy (Open Session 35)
Why do we have to struggle to further health literacy, when the future of health care seems such an important issue today? Why don’t people just embrace it? Those were the questions that panel member Delores Isham-Colvard, PhD, RN posed in the first presentation of this open session. Jane Krauhs, PhD, moderated the panel of three persons who shared their success stories; in them we find tools for improving our own efforts.
Isham-Colvard, manager of Patient Communication at Children’s Hospital, Dallas, noted that the costs of failing to promote health literacy are high, with communication failures at the root of so many problems, including legal liability, in health care. As far as getting others involved in health literacy, first, she says, “put your face out there.” Get on committees. Here, she told her own “Saga of Pee and Poop” and her experience with her hospital administration who strongly preferred using “urination” or “making water” in brochures. Using words that patients, and especially children, understand is not dumbing down. Writing at the literacy level of most Americans—the 5th or 6th grade level—only makes sense. We should write for our audience.
Shirin Pestonjee, MS, RN, reinforced Isham-Colvard's point. Pestonjee is a patient education specialist at Parkland Health & Hospital System in Dallas. Surveys taken in 1988 and 1998 attest to the success of the Parkland program, which begins with an orientation of new employees. She points out from the very beginning, employees are encouraged to use words that patients understand, like… “pee in the cup,” not “void in the cup.” Many health professionals want to talk at higher reading levels; they are either unaware and can’t grasp the scope of levels, or fear that patients will feel “talked down to.” She gave the example of a fancy packaged system of health information that the employees, after they came to an understanding of literacy levels, rejected—because the reading was at a 12th grade level.
Isham-Colvard, manager of Patient Communication at Children’s Hospital, Dallas, noted that the costs of failing to promote health literacy are high, with communication failures at the root of so many problems, including legal liability, in health care. As far as getting others involved in health literacy, first, she says, “put your face out there.” Get on committees. Here, she told her own “Saga of Pee and Poop” and her experience with her hospital administration who strongly preferred using “urination” or “making water” in brochures. Using words that patients, and especially children, understand is not dumbing down. Writing at the literacy level of most Americans—the 5th or 6th grade level—only makes sense. We should write for our audience.
Shirin Pestonjee, MS, RN, reinforced Isham-Colvard's point. Pestonjee is a patient education specialist at Parkland Health & Hospital System in Dallas. Surveys taken in 1988 and 1998 attest to the success of the Parkland program, which begins with an orientation of new employees. She points out from the very beginning, employees are encouraged to use words that patients understand, like… “pee in the cup,” not “void in the cup.” Many health professionals want to talk at higher reading levels; they are either unaware and can’t grasp the scope of levels, or fear that patients will feel “talked down to.” She gave the example of a fancy packaged system of health information that the employees, after they came to an understanding of literacy levels, rejected—because the reading was at a 12th grade level.
Getting your manuscript published (Open Session 28)
This was a great panel discussion about the details that give your manuscripts an edge in the eyes of the reviewers or editors. Marianne Mallia served as moderator. Her panelists were an author’s editor and journal editor in-chief.
Christine Wogan, MS, ELS, the author’s editor, from the UT M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, phrased her take-home messages for other author’s editors clearly:
Christine Wogan, MS, ELS, the author’s editor, from the UT M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, phrased her take-home messages for other author’s editors clearly:
- Pick your battles.
- Hook 'em.
- Give 'em what they want.
- Make it easy on them.
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