Learning to collaborate, care
In the same way a person can sense a storm coming, a mother knows when something is wrong with her child.
Jennifer Bruno of Pittsburgh participated in a case study earlier this week, but this wasn't a small roundtable of doctors looking at the symptoms of just any person.
About 200 Slippery Rock University students broke into groups to listen, analyze and learn from the case of Bruno's daughter, Cassie, who recently celebrated her 14th birthday.
“We were at fire capacity for the ballroom (in the Robert M. Smith Student Center),” said Michele Crytzer, chairwoman of the Interprofessional Education Collaborative.
The group sang “Happy Birthday” to Cassie, a feat she heard, but could not see.
Cassie is blind and autistic. She was born prematurely at 25 weeks. At birth, she weighed 1 pound, 14 ounces.
Cassie was diagnosed with permanent blindness shortly after her birth, but her autism diagnosis took time.
Cassie spent countless hours in hospitals and therapy, and her story inspired the event's group of students who are in various health-related majors. The teen's moving story was told by her tired and determined mother.
Each student was given a handout detailing Cassie's medical history, past and current treatments, functional status, medications and social history.
Each table of students was asked to formulate questions for Bruno to further understand the case.
The catch — no two students of the same major were seated at the same table.
At least 11 health care-related majors were represented at the study, including nursing, health care administration and various therapies.
After students finished discussing the case with tablemates, one by one a student at each table asked a question to further understand Cassie's case.
One table's question spoke to Bruno's biggest struggle throughout her interactions with the health care system: Is there anything we can do better on our end?
“I think a mom's instinct is greater than anything,” Bruno said.
Another student asked what advice Bruno had for other parents with autistic children.
“Never stop fighting for your child,” she said.
In answering questions, Bruno also talked about her struggles when it came to diagnosing Cassie's autism. She said on multiple occasions, she had to push the medical professionals to look closer at an unusually underdeveloped toddler.“Always fight for what your child needs and find a good support group,” she said.Bruno also shared minor critiques of the professionals.“A lot of the doctors were brutally honest, and then the nurse would swoop in and do the consoling,” Bruno said.Bruno shared other opinions and examples of why the medical system is failing parents like herself. She said there was too much red tape, and too little time to break through it.“There has to be an easier way,” she said.“I'm a fan of the providers,” she noted. “Of the system overall? Not such a fan.”After the question and answer session, students returned to deliberate and consider how they could help someone like Cassie.Crytzer said the goal of the gathering was learning to work as a unit across disciplines.“Typically, the health care profession is taught in silos,” Crytzer said. “When the students graduate and go into the workforce, it's not a silo anymore. They have to work with the other professions.”Crytzer said colleges should be teaching students how to work with other professions before they enter the workforce.“We started knocking down the silos at Slippery Rock,” she said.Hannah Floyd, a senior undergraduate student of music therapy, said she felt every word as Bruno told the students about Cassie's gravitation toward music and the girl's ability to sing lyrics to songs better than she can speak conversationally.She said it also hurt her to hear that Cassie's music therapy is not covered by her health insurance.“Specifically, I thought the insurance for music therapy not being covered was absolutely horrible because it's the thing that helps her the most,” Floyd said.
While her goal is to work with victims of sexual assault and human trafficking, Floyd said there will be plenty of patients like Cassie along her career path.She said they all need help, but some need a way to speak indirectly to convey their thoughts and feelings.“When she said that she sings better than she talks, that happens,” Floyd said. “For me, when I was sitting there, I was thinking I would write this song to help her with this, and I would write this song to help her with that.”Renee Jannetti is in the public health master's degree program, but she has been a nurse for the past 17 years.Jannetti said showing the difficulties of today's health care system to students is important.“Patient-centered care is how everything should work, but it doesn't. It needs a lot of work,” Jannetti, adding how it is difficult to see people struggle in the way that Bruno and her daughter struggle. “It should be so easy. We live in the United States of America, the greatest country in the world, and we should be able to have the resources at our disposal to take care of our people.”Jannetti said Bruno found a way to make an impact on future generations of doctors, nurses, therapists and administrators by sharing her struggle while they are still impressionable and willing to forge their ideals around patient-care.“This case is great tonight. The family is wonderful. They're a very good resource for letting these students hear about this now during their education and hopefully we can make some changes as a society,”she said.One of the last questions was not about medicine, but rather about being a mother. “What's the best part about being a mother to Cassie?” one student asked.“She makes people not take things for granted,” Bruno answered. “She makes me a better person. She makes everybody a better person.”
