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When Is the Right Time to Hire a Patient Advocate?

Patient advocacy is often misunderstood as something families seek only in extreme situations. In reality, patient advocacy is most effective before healthcare becomes overwhelming. When medical care involves multiple providers, recent hospitalizations, unclear next steps, or mounting insurance and billing concerns, patients and caregivers are often navigating a system that has quietly grown too complex to manage alone.

What Patient Advocacy Really Is

Patient advocacy is a professional service focused on healthcare navigation. Advocates help patients and families understand medical information, coordinate communication between providers, and address insurance and billing challenges. They do not provide medical treatment or make decisions for patients; instead, they support informed decision-making and continuity of care.

Why Healthcare Becomes Overwhelming

Healthcare complexity rarely arrives all at once. It builds over time—additional specialists, tests, transitions, authorizations, paperwork, and bills. Each element may feel manageable on its own, but together they can create confusion, stress, and decision fatigue.

This complexity is not a reflection of a family’s ability. It is a structural reality of modern healthcare systems.

Common Signs Families Need Support

Families often benefit from patient advocacy when:

  • Multiple providers are involved with limited communication
  • A loved one has been hospitalized or recently discharged
  • Instructions or next steps feel unclear
  • Insurance requirements delay or complicate care
  • Medical bills are confusing or unexpected
  • Caregivers feel overwhelmed or unsure how to proceed

These are not failures. They are indicators that navigation support may be helpful.

What a Patient Advocate Does—and Does Not Do

 Patient advocates:

  • Organize and clarify information
  • Coordinate communication
  • Support understanding and planning

They do not diagnose, prescribe, or replace healthcare providers.

Why Asking for Help Earlier Matters

Early support often prevents larger problems later. When families seek guidance before a crisis, they are better positioned to make thoughtful decisions, reduce stress, and avoid preventable complications.

Patient advocacy is not about handing decisions to someone else—it is about gaining clarity in a system that often feels fragmented and difficult to navigate. For many families, the right time to seek advocacy support is not during a crisis, but when complexity begins to build. Early guidance can reduce stress, prevent avoidable problems, and help patients and caregivers move forward with confidence rather than urgency.

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LORI IS EXTREMELY TALENTED!

What a great use of Lori’s talents!

I worked with Lori for several years during my career as an orthopedic surgeon. I know her to be not only compassionate and understanding but also a tireless advocate for what is right.

In difficult situations she was unwavering in her quest to enable me to provide the best possible care for my patients. She knows the system and how to work through it (and around it whenever necessary

LORI JUMPED RIGHT IN

If you are in need of a patient advocate, I would highly recommend Lori Schellenberg. She is extremely knowledgeable, effective, and professional. Knows when to be strong and forceful yet loving and caring with your loved one and your family. I was concerned about an elderly family member who had several severe falls, was forgetting to take medication, not eating healthy and not keeping up with housekeeping yet insistent she was fine and staying in her home. Even though Lori lived out of state she made phone calls on our behalf, made several recommendations to help us provide what our loved one needed and was an intermediary when it was necessary. Lori’s knowledge of geriatrics, continuous care/assisted living facilities, the health care system, long term care insurance and hospice is invaluable. She helped us put together a plan that provided the best and continuous care necessary for our loved one and our family. We are extremely thankful for her help and look forward to continuing to work with her as our loved one moves through the next phases of her life’s journey, thus enabling us to create loving memories.

LORI JUMPED RIGHT IN

My husband underwent nasal surgery 6 months ago, after he had a negative sleep study test and was referred to an ENT doctor due to continued fatigue and snoring.

Unfortunately, he developed two different serious infections, and we were concerned about his ongoing treatment with the ENT. In fact, we were very anxious because he wasn’t getting better but the surgeon was not clear with us as to what to do next.

When describing what was going on, Lori jumped right in, when she found out my husband was actually at the surgeon’s office at that time, and still did not understand the situation. She recommended that my husband ask to have the surgeon come back into the room, and to call her so that she could speak to the surgeon with my husband in the room. Lori was very professional and knowledgeable in her approach with his surgeon. She established a treatment plan, in a way that my husband could understand, and why this was the plan. She also discussed the “what ifs” the current treatment plan did not work. He ordered further tests to be completed prior to his next appointment, if he did not improve.

She followed up with my husband and I to make sure we understood the plan.

By advocating for my husband, Lori relieved a lot of anxiety and stress that this current medical concern was causing, and they felt more confident in the surgeon’s care.

We highly recommend Lori and Stepping Stone Advocacy Services, if you are experiencing a medical condition, and don’t know where to turn for answers. She is experienced and professional, yet able to discuss medical terms in a way that we understood.