Manifesto Serves as a Pledge for Health Professionals, Patients and Caregivers to Make Healthcare a Deeper Partnership Between All Stakeholders
BOSTON—October 8, 2019—The Society for Participatory Medicine (SPM), the preeminent organization in promoting true partnerships between patients, caregivers and healthcare professionals, today calls on these stakeholders to demonstrate their commitment to helping fix healthcare by adhering to and advancing the core tenets of participatory medicine. These ideals are outlined in the new Participatory Medicine Manifesto.
This movement is driven to create a collaborative, inclusive, compassionate, and mutually respectful healthcare environment. As part of the pledge, all stakeholders promise to: Share and Listen, Respect One Another, Share Information Responsibly, Promote Curiosity and Be a Teambuilder.
Open communication among providers, patients and caregivers is a prerequisite for quality healthcare, patient satisfaction and cost-effectiveness. To help facilitate open dialogue, SPM has developed a manifesto, outlining a shared goal to empower and embolden patients, healthcare professionals and caregivers by spreading the practice of participatory medicine.
“Healthcare is in crisis, with uneven quality, rising costs, dissatisfied patients, and burnt out healthcare professionals – it must change,” said Burt Rosen, president of the Society for Participatory Medicine. “One way to improve it is to focus on the relationships and interactions between healthcare professionals, patients and caregivers. We came together over the past year with members, friends, last year’s conference attendees and others to draft statements that we all felt comfortable committing to. That’s what our manifesto is. People coming together and pledging to fix the healthcare experience.”
“This manifesto is the result of many people with diverse backgrounds and perspectives on healthcare coming together with a shared goal of driving notable improvements,” said Dr. Danny Sands, a co-founder and board co-chair of the Society for Participatory Medicine. “By encouraging shared conversations among patients, caregivers and healthcare professionals, we can truly make a difference in how care is both delivered and received. We hope that people share this manifesto, post it on social media, and use it to explain how we think and why SPM exists. We are taking action to transform the culture of care and hope everyone will join us.”
The Society encourages everyone to share their support for participatory medicine by uploading a short video here.
These videos will be compiled and shared during SPM’s annual conference to be held October 15, 2019 at the Seaport World Trade Center in Boston. During this event, “Time 4 Change: Making Participatory Medicine Real,” attendees will learn how to practice participatory healthcare as a patient, caregiver or healthcare professional, how to help others practice participatory healthcare and why it matters. Sponsors include the American College of Radiology, Kairos, PatientsLikeMe, Salem Oaks, Inspire, Psych Central, HealthSparq, Wego Health, Backpack Health, OpenMD.com, VSP Global and Conversa Health.
For more information on attending or sponsoring the conference, please visit participatorymedicine.org/conference.
About the Society for Participatory Medicine
Created by a passionate group of professionals, caregivers and patients with a vision to start a movement to transform the culture of healthcare, The Society for Participatory Medicine (SPM) is a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit membership organization devoted to promoting the concept of participatory medicine, a movement in which activated empowered patients engage as drivers of their health, and in which providers encourage and collaborate with them as full partners in their care. SPM does this by stimulating dialogue, influencing policy, advocating research, and educating patients, health care professionals, and others. SPM members include stakeholders from across the healthcare continuum.
Please visit SPM via Twitter, Facebook and at participatorymedicine.org for more information.
