Air Force Medical Service

When you partner with your healthcare team, you help make your healthcare safer, more effective, and more satisfying.

Partnering with your healthcare team is important to:

• Improving your health and wellbeing
• Recovering from illness and injury
• Making sure care is safe and effective

While your healthcare provider is an expert on medical care, YOU are the expert on yourself, your needs, and what has worked best for you in the past.

By working together, you can develop a care plan that includes healthcare choices that best match your values, preferences, and needs.

Healthcare is complex and potentially dangerous with lots of moving parts. You have a big role in making sure care is safe. Read more below and also check out this fact sheet from the National Patient Safety Foundation’s Lucian Leape Institute.

For some patients, being actively involved in their care as a partner is something new. But YOU best know your values, preferences, and needs, and your healthcare team needs to hear them:

• Don't be a passive receiver of care; you are an active partner.
• Your healthcare team should not be doing things "to" you; they should be doing things "with" you.

You and your healthcare team need to work together to get the most out of health care appointments. Here are a few tips to help prepare you for your visit:

• Review your notes from last visit.
• Before your appointment, make a list of any questions, symptoms, and concerns that you have. Bring this list to your appointment, so you won’t forget anything.
• Get all your medications ready to bring in to the clinic. Bring in original labeled containers, and don’t forget over the counter and herbal supplements.
• Be prepared to describe when, how, and how often you take each of your medications/supplements.
• Make sure you bring pen and paper to your appointments.
• Make a list of other healthcare providers that you are seeing, what they are treating you for, and any tests or studies you may have had under their care. This is very important if you are getting care in the TRICARE civilian provider network.
• Bring a friend or family member to help you remember answers to your questions or other details of the visit.
• Tell the truth, even if it is embarrassing. Your health care team needs to know the full picture!

Partnering with your healthcare team doesn’t have to be limited to face-to-face visits. RelayHealth - MiCare Secure Messaging is an online application that allows you to securely communicate with your healthcare team. TRICARE Online Patient Portal allows you to keep track of your lab and radiology results; diagnoses; visit dates; vital signs; and medications. All of these tools can help you prepare for your next appointment.

Your healthcare team is committed to communicating with you through secure messaging. No more phone tag or waiting to speak with the nurse or provider.

Secure Messaging Tips:

• Secure messaging is NOT appropriate for medical emergencies and urgencies.
• Be clear, detailed, and comprehensive. Upload attachments and pictures, as necessary.
• Understand the difference between a medication renewal versus a refill.

Medication renewal: You don't have any more refills on your current prescription. Your provider has to write a NEW prescription. Appropriate for secure messaging.

Medication refill: You have one or more refills on your current prescription. You can refill through TRICARE Online Patient Portal or calling the pharmacy. You do NOT want to use secure messaging to request a refill.

• Understand that if your message is intended for your healthcare provider, it will be first reviewed by your healthcare team's administrative staff or nurse. Don't send a message that can only be understood by one person, like "Can you give me follow up on that problem we talked about last week?"