 Thank you everyone for joining this webinar today, and we really appreciate You joining the listening in so this is our very first webinar and titled how to effectively contact legislators We have the patient safety movement foundation focus on five main groups and one is policy So we wanted to really ensure that we're educating the public on you know How to contact legislators from the first step to the very end So I what before we get started a few housekeeping items for all of you attendees that have joined we are in webinar mode So all of you are on mute and you won't be able to unmute yourself during the call But if you have any questions and there is a Q&A chat box at the very very bottom So please send through any questions that you might have and at the very end We will hopefully have time to answer them and have a little bit of discussion And so with that said I thought we'd kick it off and introduce the patient safety movement foundation team I will go ahead and start. My name is Sarah Miller I'm our director of partnerships here at the foundation and I've been here for about three and a half years now So I will pass it on to Arianna Hey Sarah. Hi everyone. I'm Arianna Lumley, and I'm the chief operating officer here at the patient safety movement foundation and I've been with the foundation for a little over five years and really interested in how we can Help you contact your legislators. So with that I'll pass it off to Sana Hi everyone, my name is Sana Dattar And I am a health policy intern with the patient safety movement foundation I've only been here for the summer, but I'm really excited and interested to get involved with policy and help PSMF with that. And so I'll pass it over to Monica. Hi, I'm Monica McDade and I'm the campaign director for Unite for Safe Care And I've been with the foundation since December Great Well with that said, Sana, do you want to advance to the next slide and we'll pass it over to Arianna to give a little bit of an intro Sure. Awesome. Well, thank you so much to everyone who's on the line I see that we also have some international Presence on the line. So thank you for joining in Saudi Arabia at 11 p.m. Your time. That is dedication I know that many of you probably know a little or even a lot about the patient safety movement foundation But for those that may be new to our network, I'm just going to spend a few minutes sharing our work And also I want to just address that if anyone is or joining us internationally This is really about how to contact legislators here in the United States So the links that you'll see Lead to our US government websites. However, I'm sure that many of the concepts can still Translate into action outside of the United States So the patient safety movement foundation is an international nonprofit that has the goal of zero preventable patient deaths If you've been with us for a while, we started in 2012 and our initial goal was to reach zero by 2020 But obviously we're here now in 2020 and we know that we still have a lot of patient harm and death that's occurring So we have extended that goal to 2030 We feel like that really audacious goal is important to focus on zero because one preventable patient death is one too many I can imagine that many of you may have experienced harm yourself Or may have lost a loved one and we are here because of you We don't want any more of this to happen And so each person each individual is really important and for that reason we have to try to achieve zero We also have focused on 2030 because we feel that there's urgency in attaching our mission to a date We could certainly say zero by 2050 and feel like we might be More likely to make that goal But we want people to urgently feel like we have to do something about that and that's part of this legislative push as well We we need to talk to our congressional leaders and leaders across the world to make sure that patient safety is a priority So with that we we believe that storytelling is Extremely important to help legislators understand these issues more deeply whether it was a harm because of a medication a harm because of a lack of communication We have to let our legislators know what's going on real life day in and day out So we will be sending out this presentation as a PDF after the webinar is over So any of the hyperlinks you see in our deck you will be able to click on I mentioned our actionable patient safety solutions here These are clinical best practice documents that we've put together and they're made freely available to Administrators and clinicians as well as you if you really wanted to look at them But they're there I guess tools that these hospitals and other health care organizations can put in place And if they do we've seen these hospitals and health care organizations across the world achieve amazing things reducing preventable harm and reducing preventable deaths in their Systems and institutions So I bring those up because you may be on the phone today because you've had someone in your family or yourself as I've Mentioned be effective. And so if you are speaking to your legislator These actionable patient safety solutions can be helpful to show them that there is a solution for many of these issues We have over 39 solutions on our website and and are rolling out new solutions Quarterly and pass it over to the next slide World Patient Safety Day was declared last year by the World Health Organization And so the second annual is coming up on September 17th and United for Safe Care is our awareness campaign Around this issue. Most people don't know that this is the third leading cause of death in the United States It's 14th in the world in terms of Patients dying in hospitals and so we want to raise the awareness We will be having a small memorial ceremony on September 16th and 17th in Washington DC with some volunteers and then we also have a wonderful program designed as a virtual event on YouTube and that will air on September 17th at 5 p.m. Eastern Time We also have a way that people around the globe can Walk with us. That is a downloadable app called charity miles and For example, our CEO has been walking Over 1500 miles Basically, he is virtually walking across the United States from ballpark to baseball park. He's a big baseball fan so we have over 500 people walking with us around the globe and We hope to get to 200,000 miles Symbolic of the 200,000 people who lose their lives to preventable medical errors in the United States every year We do have a big awareness campaign starting right after Labor Day on September 8th and for 10 days We hope to raise funds and we'll have a little auction online And we hope that people will help us push out that message on social media I should also mention that we have a number of partners around the globe who are also activating in place and they are Lighting up buildings their hospitals Fountains flagpoles They are walking in solidarity with us on that same day. So if you do want to activate Take pictures and post on social media and share those with those you love So I will pass it on to the next slide Great. So let's get started and get into how to reach out to Legislators so there are in the United States several people, you know that you can go through in order to get your message heard And so in the House of Representatives, you can look up your congressional district and find out who your local congressperson is using your zip code To a member of the Senate you can look up who you should be reaching out to you by the state and Additionally, there are state legislative representatives So these would be people in the state Senate who are more local to whatever state you live in And so you can look these up by state as well Additionally, there is an access to federal legislation where you can look on Congress's website and see the types of things the types of Proposals they've already been set out by different legislators So you can see what kinds of issues they are already interested in and that can help you to Connect with your congressperson senator or whoever you may want to reach out to So as Arianna mentioned earlier sharing stories is extremely important in the public policy process It's necessary to bring awareness to an issue and inspire change So legislators will hear and receive individuals and their stories a lot better than organizations So although we at the patient safety movement have been pushing to get policy passed That is going to help us reach our goal of zero preventable deaths It is always a lot better for legislators to hear individually from people in their Constituency that they're actually there to serve and they want to help so although it seems Daunting you know reaching out to a legislator in that type of position They are people too and they will connect best with other people that are Individual constituents that are going to reach out to them who have been touched by a lot of these issues So this is really one of the best ways to inspire real change is by sharing your own story or stories that you've heard from people within your district or in your state that have actually gone through You know the hospital system and seen some of the preventable deaths or preventable harm that happens So one of the main ways to reach out to a legislator is to write a letter This is a little old-fashioned in certain ways Now that we have other ways to reach out through email But writing a letter whether it is an email or an actual letter that you're going to be sending through the mail Will make a great impact on legislators if it's individualized personalized and has specific information So some of the most effective information that you can include in a letter is your personal story how you've been touched by Preventable medical harm or errors or deaths and how some kind of bill or some kind of change in The health policy or patient safety policy would help impact you and your district that you live in so this could be Something that you have experienced in a certain area and a certain health system and you want to talk about how a Change in policy could actually make a difference and then additionally if you do have a specific request or an ask With the reasoning behind it. So let's say that's something like an issue happened because of lack of communication within Patient handoff in a hospital. You could have a specific ask and say Dear legislator, please Take a look at the specific issue. This is what has happened And if you could make a change or draft a bill that is going to have an impact on this specific issue So really knowing what you want to ask your legislator for or what type of change you hope to see is going to make them Understand your point of view and your story a little bit better so the format of a letter or an email that you're going to send to either your congressperson your senator or a Local legislator the first thing you're going to want to do is set the stage paint a picture of what's currently happening in patient safety so as many of you know, it is the third leading cause of death in the United States and Most likely will have a personal experience with this You want to talk about that in a really general and broad view and then describe Why do you want change what change is going to happen that would make a positive impact on? Not only your own life, but other people and to avoid certain issues from coming up again in the future So discussing how a positive impact could be made on yourself your district and other people like you is really going to Hit home with the legislator because they want to be there for their constituents and they want to make a difference In the capacity that they're able to and that's going to be for the people that they represent And then you just want to finish with a hook or a call to action if you have a specific ask That you're going to be talking about you want to say that for the end and say this is what I really want And remember always to thank them for their time because they have a number of issues on their plate And if this is one that's really important to you You want to make sure that you're thanking them for taking the time to at least read what you have to say So the readable length of an email or a letter that you send should be about a hundred to three hundred words This has been found by the Congressional Management Foundation that Most legislators are going to want to keep read a letter or an email that is kept within that range Anything shorter they may not take it seriously anything longer. They may not have the time to read So you want to make sure to be concise and to the point of what your goal is in reaching out So include a subject line. This is important in order to catch their attention. Make sure it's directed at Patient safety whatever issue that you are particularly asking for so make sure to keep it concise Just so that they still have the time to read through what you're saying Okay, next we're going to talk about how to Personalize a letter or an email that you send so often times Personalization is what makes a letter or email stand out Most legislators whether it's a congressperson or a senator probably get hundreds if not thousands of letters and emails Probably each day each month that they need to sort through so Personalizing a letter or an email is going to really help you stand out and make them want to contact you and make a change So some of the things that you can research about a particular legislator is their political party So you can use this to your advantage depending on what party they belong to you can look at the party platform and say hey There is something in your party platform regarding patient safety or regarding An improvement of health care quality so you can use that to your advantage to make a connection with a legislator Next you want to look at the committees and leadership that they hold So if this is a person of Congress In the House of Representatives, they're going to be on a certain committee and that committee will deal with a Specific issue or a more niche issue than what Congress will generally be dealing with So if their committee that they're on happens to deal with health care Or even if it doesn't try to find a way to kind of connect that to the issue that you want to talk about And even better if they are in a position of leadership, let's say they're the chair of a certain committee You can use that as well to say I know you are the chair on this committee and you have a big say in what happens And so this is why I'm reaching out to you specifically because I think you can really make a change or an impact And then you also want to talk about or address the issues of focus So you can look up any legislator and any Congress person senator and kind of see the issues that they focus on or What they have been fighting for throughout their career whether they're Position or they've been around for a long time usually legislators have certain issues that they like to focus on and that They want to talk about so you find one that connects To what you're interested in advocating for it. That's a good way to make that connection and then the next thing you want to research is Personal items about the legislators. So where they're from a lot of times if this is a state representative They're going to be from the state that you are in Potentially they could be from the same city And that kind of goes into where did they go to school a lot of times Legislators want to represent the districts where they came from or where they grew up where they got their education So let's say you went to the same high school or the same College as your legislator You might want to bring that up because that's going to foster that connection as a person you and the legislator Just two people who have these commonalities Additionally, a lot of them have different interests hobbies and family and kids So that's a really big one. Most of these people are parents, too And if you are a parent a lot of times parent-to-parent discussions Or a lot go a lot better When you have that connection so reaching out and making sure you know that if you have been affected by a patient safety issue You want to talk about talk about and reach out parent-to-parent. That's a really important way to get their attention And so kind of going off of that you want to answer the question of why should they care? So if you have experienced Preventable medical harm or death and it has to deal with a child like I talked about you can reach out and say, you know You should care about this Legislator because you have kids of your own or you have family members that could potentially go through something like this You want to kind of answer that question? Why should they care and find that connection to make sure that they are going to be Cognizant aware of this issue Okay, so the next thing we're going to talk about is making a call So this is really similar to emails and letter writing But it's just a little more concise So the difference between writing a letter an email and making a call is oftentimes you make a call in order to Set up a meeting with the legislator if you're sending an email or a letter A lot of times you're going to just want an email or a letter in return before you're setting up a meeting So if a meeting is what you desire with this legislator or congressperson You're going to want to try to call their office The format of this call is going to be really similar to how you would structure your letter or email So you're going to open with who you are and the reason for making this call Talk about patient safety and what it is that you're interested in what kind of change you're interested in making And then express your interest in speaking personally with the legislator so although this might seem a little bit daunting as I said Legislators are people too and if you express that interest of talking to them person to person and You might fare a little bit better than if you gave a really general kind of scripted call so you can also find out a lot of Legislators during this time during COVID are Scheduling virtual meetings. So either through zoom or Skype and you might be able to request one So in your research when you're trying to find out more about your legislator You can probably find on on their website or on their office page Whether or not they're taking meetings and you can talk about this in your call when you either leave a message or talk to a staff member Saying hey, I would like to schedule meeting for these reasons So usually calls are going to be filtered by a member of this legislators staff They're pretty busy, so they won't be answering the phone themselves most likely but a staff member is more likely to relay your message to a legislator if it is compelling and personalized like we talked about Personalization and really sharing your story is going to be what gets to your legislator to make the biggest impact so Use that to your advantage. Although sharing your story might be difficult This is the way to connect and for them to really take the weight of this problem seriously and hold a virtual Meeting with you and consider that so some some tips for calling and scheduling meetings and a lot of times members of Congress will have multiple offices So this will be a home office in whichever state you reside in and then there will also be a DC office So calling each office gives you a better chance of landing a meeting with them So these are really busy people and like I said, you're going to be talking to a staffer most likely And although it might be difficult to repeat your story this many times And this is the best way to actually get through to them and to get through and schedule a meeting So making sure you're calling their different offices as well as emailing If they have multiple email addresses to email each of those and then same with letter writing if you're sending a letter in the mail You probably want to send it to both offices so that there's a better chance of someone actually passing that on to the legislator themselves So we mentioned that reaching out personally is really the best way to connect with the legislator They like hearing from their constituents individually because that's who they are in office to represent But the patient safety movement foundation We do have a stake in this and do want to help you in getting your message across and getting our message across So we can support you in scheduling a meeting and even in the meeting if you'd like us to support you in your Conversation we can be there But what we're going to focus on if we are part of the meeting is our transparency aligned incentives and A push for a national patient safety board So if any of these are items that you are interested in or that you would like to push or talk to your legislator about We are more than happy to support you in your meetings or in you know reaching out to a legislator So there are a lot of ways to get involved Hopefully these kind of tips will help you to individually reach out and you can also if you don't feel comfortable with a legislator You can share your story with us and we kind of if you look at our website You can see what we do with these stories and how we leverage them to get our policy pushes across and so in addition to providing support in a meeting that you might schedule if you have questions about Contracting legislators. We do have an interest form Where you can let us know if there are specific questions that you have about Contacting your legislator and if you need help finding, you know, the right person to contact. We can't help you with that So when we share out this PowerPoint after the Webinars over there will be a link for you to put in an interest form if you do need additional support and assistance so we encourage you to connect additionally with your peers and use our network of partners to You know share your stories not only with legislators and with people who are going to make a policy impact But even just people like yourself who may have similar stories and can provide that support So social media groups, LinkedIn groups, and even signing up for newsletters about patient safety can really help the movement In depth this out there So with that I will Leave it to Sarah. We I know there were some hands raised and some questions In the chat, so please feel free to put those in right now Great. Thank you, Sana. That was a wonderful overview and very helpful and even informational for our team I'm sure it doesn't look like throughout the presentation. We received any other questions aside from whether the webinar is recorded So just want to reiterate. Yes, this webinar is currently being recorded and we will give you access to the recording and the slides In addition, we will send out the interest form as a separate link just to ensure that you all have access to it And obviously just because there are a lot of embedded links. I just want to highlight the interest form does Give you the opportunity to list, you know where you're located what state exactly in the US You would like to be contacting and if you have Specific names of legislators that you'd like to contact We would just like to ensure that you you do put as much information as possible so that we can make sure that the foundation side is Answering all your questions and pointing you in the right direction as it relates to the different groups that saw to highlight it early on So with that said, um, Ariana. Do you have any other comments or feedback that you'd like to give? No, maybe we can just sit for a minute or two and see if there's any other questions before we close out I know that we scheduled an hour and we're just approaching the half hour But we're very happy to give you all back a half hour of your time if there are no questions the one thing that I'll point to and I'll make sure that we We highlight in the follow-up email is that the three issues that we talked about on the last slide Around promoting transparency aligning payment incentives and establishing a national patient safety board But there are some quick details both on the patient safety movement website as well as unit for safe care Depending on how you found us So on the patient safety movement website, we have what that draft legislation is that we suggest and we've been having meetings with legislative legislators for Transparency and online incentives for the last Several years the national patient safety board concept is new And I just figured I'd mentioned that we will be sending out an announcement within the next week or so around our position for a national patient safety board Thanks to the work of sauna Who's writing a white paper? So just wanted to use this opportunity as a It's I guess just mini promotion for more to come specifically around the history of the national patient safety board concept and what our formal recommendations will be as an organization I Have not seen any other questions come through I will say that there there was a question that came in from the individual from Saudi Arabia that I couldn't quite pinpoint the answer to so It's you do have questions that we weren't able to answer during the call don't hesitate to shoot us an email and we'd be happy to help you If we were unable to answer your question during this time and I see Tony Galbo's comment Please be persistent and make follow-up calls So just wanted to share that with the larger group in case you didn't see that but Tony is a great advocate for you know Pushing legislation and thank you Tony for all of your help and you know pushing this forward Yes, and thank you to anyone else who might have been part of the interview process of making sure We address any of your questions and And Experiences I know that there may be a few of you who've been on the phone That we've reached out to in the weeks leading up to this webinar to make sure we learn from your successes and your mistakes And reaching out to congressional leaders so With that I will say thank you so much for joining I wish you a wonderful day and a wonderful weekend