Narrator: Coming up on Mayo Clinic Q&A,
Laura Kurland: It's a really overwhelming experience for
patients to come in here for cancer care. So, to be able to
be a support and just be a point of contact, especially with the
language barrier that sometimes exists, I think is a huge gift
that Mayo is giving to patients here.
Narrator: Navigating health care can be a complex matter for any
patient, but especially so for those with a language or
cultural barrier. To help those patients, a patient navigator
can help them communicate with their health care providers and
guide them through the healthcare system.
Laura Kurland: Our role as patient navigators is to support
with a lot of the non-clinical sides of their cancer journey.
We are a part of that clinical team, but we're there to find
what are the barriers to care, whether that's logistics,
transportation, if they have issues with lodging when they're
coming to a Mayo Clinic site for care, and certainly we're there
to be an ear, a support, a guide as they're learning how to truly
navigate the medical system.
Dr. Halena Gazelka: Welcome, everyone to Mayo Clinic Q&A. I'm
your host, Dr. Halena Gazelka. Patient navigators are a part of
the care team to help guide patients to the health care
system. at Mayo Clinic Cancer Center, patient navigators help
with everything from finding information and resources, to
offering emotional support. The Cancer Center has both general
patient navigators who assist all patients and patient
navigators who serve specific cultural patient populations.
Here to discuss this with us today is Laura Kurland, a
patient navigator serving Hispanic and Latino populations,
at the Mayo Clinic Cancer Center. Welcome to the program,
Laura.
Laura Kurland: Thank you for having me.
Dr. Halena Gazelka: What a fun topic for us to get to discuss
today. How we make it easier for people to navigate the
healthcare system. So, I'm excited. Would you mind first
describing for our listeners, how do you describe the role of
a patient navigator to patients?
Laura Kurland: Yeah, absolutely. So, I generally start by
explaining to patients that our role as patient navigators is to
support with a lot of the non-clinical sides of their
cancer journey. We are a part of that clinical team, but we're
there to find what are the barriers to care, whether that's
logistics, transportation, if they have issues with lodging,
when they're coming to a Mayo Clinic site for care, oftentimes
helping them understand the finances, whether that's
insurance, or other things that are going to be coming up that
are going to be financial stressors for them as they're
going through their cancer care. And certainly, we're there to be
an ear, a support, a guide, as they're learning how to truly
navigate the medical system, and we work with the team. So, we're
finding out who they need to reach out to for help.
Dr. Halena Gazelka: Laura, why do you think it is important to
have patient navigators who serve a specific patient
population?
Laura Kurland: I would say that the patient populations that we
work with come with different experiences. Some come with a
lack of knowledge or a lack of experience with U.S. mainstream
medical experiences, or maybe they've had negative experiences
in the past. So, our goal is to understand the values they
bring. We support them with what their needs are, whether there
are language barriers, or there's just gaps in cultural
misunderstandings. And so, our role is to help bridge those
gaps, clarify misunderstandings, and also be advocates to those
populations.
Dr. Halena Gazelka: So, Laura at Mayo Clinic what culture
specific navigators do we have?
Laura Kurland: So, currently we are just growing as a team.
We're new to these roles as patient navigators for
culturally specific communities. I support the Hispanic Latino
population here in Rochester, Minnesota. My colleague Schylar
Martin supports the Native American population in the
Rochester, I'd say Midwest region. Trudie Jackson works in
Arizona supporting the Native American population there. And
then Veronica Smith is currently helping the African descendant
population down in Florida. And I think that as we see where
those needs are, this position will hopefully grow, and we'll
find out how we can help other populations that could really
benefit from this role.
Dr. Halena Gazelka: So, Laura in your work does that mean that
you speak Spanish?
Laura Kurland: Yes, I am fully bilingual.
Dr. Halena Gazelka: Oh, wonderful. What tools are in
the navigator toolbox?
Laura Kurland: So, we really have a lot of tools both
internally and externally that we support patients with. You
know, internally we're housed in the Cancer Education Center. So,
we have a plethora of written materials. We have access to the
educators that work in the center. I work very directly
with social work and financial counselors to support patients
with their needs. We also have a lot of written materials
externally from NIH, from www.cancer.gov that we can help
access for patients. We are also connected with a lot of funding
resources. There's lots of organizations, third party
organizations that are out to help with financial grants and
education materials for patients.
Dr. Halena Gazelka: That's a lot. What do you find that
patients need the most? What do you help with most often?
Laura Kurland: I would say my role and specifically my
population, there's a lot of communication barriers. So,
definitely there's a language communication barrier. But I
would also say oftentimes I find patients needing to learn how to
do self-advocacy. So, coaching patients on how they can play a
role in their own care and the importance of dialoguing with
their clinical team. I also do a lot with explaining the role of
interpreters and language services, clarifying the
importance of relying on those language services versus having
family members or trying to just, you know, work through the
language gaps that might exist. I also see myself clarifying and
supporting patients and understanding the finance side,
what insurance looks like, and then helping them apply and
access funding resources externally.
Dr. Halena Gazelka: So, tell us a little bit more about how
navigators help to support families and their caregivers.
Laura Kurland: Yeah, I mean, oftentimes the caregivers in the
families are the doers. Patients really are overwhelmed
with the care that they're receiving, so they look to
support from people around them. So, we're helping those
caregivers access, transportation, lodging
resources, help them advocate for their patient that's getting
the care they need. I personally work a lot with adult children
who are those bilingual communicators for their parents
that are non-English speakers. And so, I try to also involve
the non-English speaking patient. And so, we become a
team together to really support the patient and meet them where
they're at with their cancer care.
Dr. Halena Gazelka: Laura, if there are patients listening at
Mayo Clinic who are interested in having a navigator work with
them, how would they find out if they were eligible, or if there
was navigator assistance in the area that they're visiting?
Laura Kurland: You know, for patients that are going to be
seen at Mayo Clinic, and especially for these culturally
specific patients, we are actually doing pre-emptive or
outreach before they even come to Mayo. So, if they're coming
for appointments, our goal is to reach out to as many as possible
prior to their visits. You know, the Cancer Education
Centers are open to the public, and they can contact us directly
or walk in and visit us if they ever need that information. I
would say for people who maybe don't have a patient navigator
option at their location for cancer care, I would recommend
that they do reach out to social work, because we truly are an
arm in support of that. And that would probably be the most
similar to what patient navigation is.
Dr. Halena Gazelka: Does every healthcare provider now supply
navigators? This was a new concept to me earlier this year.
Laura Kurland: So, currently it really is being focused here in
the Cancer Center. So, we are supporting patients whether
they're coming through medical oncology, hematology, or
radiation oncology. And so, yeah we are available to all
patients. Like I said, we do have culturally specific
navigators to help those populations. But any patient
who's coming in for cancer care can access us.
Dr. Halena Gazelka: If there are patients who are going to other
healthcare institutions that don't have navigators
necessarily, are there patient resources that they could
utilize to help their own journey?
Laura Kurland: Yeah, certainly. I think, you know, we really
rely a lot on resources like www.cancer.gov, www.cancer.org,
the American Cancer Society's website is phenomenal, but also
leaning into the social work team and any therapy supports
that are at the sites that they're going to.
Dr. Halena Gazelka: That's wonderful. Thank you for sharing
this with us today, Laura. How interesting.
Laura Kurland: Yes, thank you for this opportunity to share
our work.
Dr. Halena Gazelka: It feels like it would be a very
satisfying job. I hope that you enjoy it.
Laura Kurland: It's very satisfying. And I also feel
relieved to see that we are helping these populations. And
it's a really overwhelming experience for patients to come
in here for cancer care. So, to be able to be a support and just
be a point of contact, especially with the language
barrier that sometimes exists, I think is a huge gift that Mayo
is giving to patients here.
Dr. Halena Gazelka: It's wonderful. Our thanks to Laura
Kurland, patient navigator at Mayo Clinic Cancer Center for
being with us today to talk about her role. I hope that you
learned something. I know that I did. We wish each of you a
wonderful day.
Narrator: Mayo Clinic Q&A is a production of the Mayo Clinic
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