Following our co-founder Jennifer Sweeney's presentation at the recent American College of Physicians conference, she was interviewed for this piece in Healthcare IT Today about the importance of relatedness to both patient health and clinician wellbeing.
While the pandemic has brought the public’s attention to clinician burnout, few are aware of how prevalent it was before Covid, and how many other issues contribute to it. So, while clinicians talk with each other about their exhaustion and challenges, and patients talk with each other about challenges navigating a fragmented system, an effort to bring these stakeholders together to talk with each other to create bi-directional empathy and compassion is: 3rd Conversation.
In 2019, 3rd Conversation held interviews with organizational leaders, most of whom were also clinicians. Many leaders expressed feeling like they have a target on their backs, that they struggle to make difficult tradeoffs, and often feel their hands are tied regarding changes. These interviews led the 3rd Conversation team to design “Ignite” experiences, where clinicians sit down one on one with health administrators and a facilitator to share their experiences in the system, build relationships, and work toward more integrated decision making.
These experiences are meant to be a starting point and to help organizations use a strengths-based approach to change and catalyze groups to focus on systems-level change. For example, there’s often a lot of anxiety when starting DEI work. So, starting with a 3rd Conversation experience where the group sees each other as human beings could ensure a more collaborative process.