Ten Rules Patients Need to Know to Save Their Own Lives

We all know it’s better to prevent an illness than treat it, but there are times we may need to be admitted to the hospital for a serious illness or surgery. We also need to be aware that our healthcare system itself is a substantial risk to our wellbeing because it is so prone to “medical adverse events” (MAEs). This MAE designation is medicalese for what, in any other business, would be grouped under the headings of complications or mistakes. To grasp the magnitude of the problem, estimates suggest that as many as twice as many people will die this year as the result of MAEs as will die in car accidents on the roads and highways of America. That makes MAEs the greatest killer of Americans after cardiovascular disease and cancer and represents a death toll equivalent to one 747 jet crashing every single day of the year. How long would it take before we would stop flying if such conditions existed in the aviation industry? But we don’t have a choice when it comes to being treated in the hospital.

There are a few things we can do to minimize the chance that we fall prey to a MAE:

1. Stay out of the hospital. Hospitals are a hazard but especially for sick folks. Bacteria–super bugs–strange genetic strains that can harbor resistance to many antibiotics are much more prevalent in medical institutions that out in the real world. So get out, go home and recover there, as soon as you can ambulate. Walk if you have to, but run if you can.

2. Write it out. Write down all your medications, allergies, surgeries, vitamins, supplements, and family contact information on a piece of paper. Be sure to include not just your prescription medications but also any over the counter drugs as well. Make multiple copies. Every time someone asks you “what medications do you take?” or “do you have any allergies?” just hand them a printed copy. It saves time and it ensures everyone on your health care team has the same accurate information in your medical chart.

3. Question everything. Ask about every pill you’re being given to swallow, every drop of medication going into your veins. Also every tube of blood that’s taken and every test that’s ordered. Find out the names of all the doctors coming around and which doctor goes with which problem. The more questions you ask, the more you know to stop an error from being committed.

4. Find a guardian angel. Find someone—a family member or close friend—to keep a journal and take notes about everything that’s happening to you and what’s being (or not being) said, when tests are ordered, and which doctor is supposed to come by when. People pay attention when they see you’re paying attention: no one keeps speeding on the highway when they see the patrol car sitting by the underpass.

5. Be good to your nurse. Reach out to your healthcare team, but especially to the nurses because they are taking care of you directly. Nursing has undergone a dramatic transformation in the last three decades. It’s no longer the province of bedpans and finding vases for flowers. Nursing is the real place where medicine happens human being to human being. It is the nurses who provide the large measure of compassion, comfort, and advocacy we hope to see in our healthcare system. Be kind, respectful, and grateful and most of them will shower you with considerate care and attention.

6. Attitude is everything. You’re not sick, you’re recovering. You have to be motivated to recover, to make yourself as well as you can. As soon as your doctor says you can get out of bed, start moving around. Get the blood circulating. Walking prevents blood clots (a complication) from forming in the legs too.

7. Yogurt is magic. If you must take antibiotics (and your doctors have given permission to eat a regular diet), eat yogurt three times a day to prevent bad bacteria from taking over your intestinal tract. The bacteria in yogurt keep your gut replenished with benign bacteria rather than pathogenic ones (also a complication).

8. Fill your basket with fruit and veggies. Eat plenty of fruit and get the bowels working regularly. Eat plenty of roughage from vegetables and whole grains. And organic, locally grown produce is, in my opinion, safer for you, especially during recovery, and it’s better for the environment and the local economy. Eat well and do well.

9. Take a breather. If you been under anesthesia, have the nursing staff show how to properly breathe and refill your lungs. Many of the tiny air sacs in your lungs have temporarily and partially collapsed. Deep breathing helps re-inflate these sacs and prevent atelectasis (collapsed lung) or pneumonia (bacteria that like to grow in collapsed lungs). Both complications.

10. You need a break. Don’t be foolish enough to worry about getting back to work too soon. Most co-workers are more than willing to fill in for you while you’re recovering from a serious illness or surgery. There are no medals being handed out for getting back to work before you’ve healed. Rest speeds recovery and you get well faster by resting adequately and restoring a normal sleep pattern as soon as you can.

The medical field may be very sophisticated and technical but staying alive is usually a matter of following a few simple guidelines that will hopefully make the journey to wellness a smooth one.