Sara RIggare, one of the earliest members of our Society, has just received a great honor: Fokus magazine (“Sweden’s Time“) has named her “Swede of the Year” in medicine. In the photo from the award ceremony she seems appropriately thrilled.:-)

A Parkinson’s patient, Sara is truly an exemplary e-patient. She blogs as “Sara the self tracker,” says she’s “not patient but im-patient,” and has long been a leader in the Medicine X community.

She’s also the creator of the “one red dot” meme that is shown at many conferences (but not enough!). As the text says, it makes the point that the vast majority of what she does to manage her condition is in self-care; each dot is one hour of the year. The one red dot is the two 30 minute appointments with her specialists; the blue dots show when she’s on her own.

This reality precisely illustrates what Doc Tom Ferguson knew when, in the 1980s, he published Medical Self-Care magazine. She’s also on the patient advisory panel at The BMJ.

Congratulations to Sara, and kudos to Fokus magazine for recognizing that a patient can truly be a leading contributor to the future of care!