Patient Advocacy Masterclass

When I ask new doulas what it means to be a patient advocate, many answer, "it means to be the patient's voice." But it is not our role as birth workers to be anyone else's voice for them! That is another way to displace power from a birth giver, to suppose we can somehow speak for them better than they can speak for themselves. But how do we teach clients to advocate for themselves within the rigid power structure of the medical care model? In a world which has rigidly socialized women, trans and non binary people to agree, fawn and submit? And what can we do when a client is advocating for themselves clearly but their wishes are still being ignored or bulldozed? Where are the edges when our clients are unconscious or in too much pain to speak to give or revoke consent? 

In this workshop you will…