April 18, 2019, Vol. 17, Issue 2
The opiate epidemic is in the news every day, but there’s another issue revolving around prescription drugs and seniors that is looming in the background. If you’re planning any events around seniors, caregiving, or patient issues, you need to know about our speaker, Dr. Marie Savard. For that matter, if you have aging parents, you’ll want to read this, too.
A tall order? Think that because you’re not a doctor, you’re not up to the responsibility? Think again. According to Dr. Marie, there’s no one better qualified than YOU!
Dr. Marie’s lifelong passion has been to help people take charge of their health decisions. She originally focused on women’s health, and that is how I became aware of her work. I found her to be a knowledgeable and powerful speaker.
These days, however, she’s shifted her focus. It’s still patient empowerment, but she’s now devoted to educating and empowering the children of aging parents and helping them manage their seniors’ medications while treating what really matters.
Dr. Marie Savard:
TREAT WHAT MATTERS
Dr. Marie’s passion for this topic grew out of her own experience with two aging parents, where she learned first-hand the risks that seniors face when they take too many medications.
This personal experience combined with her medical practice and her role as corporate medical director of a PACE program (Programs of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly), and seven nursing homes in Philadelphia, gave her the impetus to focus on an evolving problem — the dangers of taking too many medications (polypharmacy) especially by seniors.
“You know in your head and heart when a loved one is taking too many medications.
“The real problem is that you don’t know quite what to do about that nagging sense of doubt or worry about someone taking too many medications,” Dr. Marie said.
“Medical school taught me how to prescribe medications, but I had to teach myself to gather the courage to taper and stop medications even when other physicians didn’t agree,” she says.
“Reducing the number of medications made a huge difference to my parents. But it wasn’t easy. My parents’ story and countless other stories of seniors I have cared for or connected with over these years inspired me to return to my work at AskDrMarie, sharing the life-saving magic of simplifying medications for a parent or loved one.
“I want to give you the courage to take action and guide you through the steps you can take to help yourself or a loved one,” she continued. “It really could save a life. You may be thinking that managing your parents’ medications is a doctor’s job but just think about this for a minute:
No one knows more and cares more about your parents or loved ones than YOU.
“Learning all you can about your loved ones’ medications and working with their physicians and practitioners to reduce and simplify their medications will do more to help them survive and even thrive than so many other things you can do,” she says.
“I created AskDrMarie because I am passionate about seniors taking too many medications. I know many of you can relate and have your own worries about your aging parents or a loved one. By sharing our stories we can strengthen each others’ resolve to make a real difference in the lives of the people we care about.
“When it comes to medications many of you are thinking, but I’m not an expert, how can I question what a family member or loved one is taking? The truth is you can and you must. Everything we put in our mouth counts. Medications can have many good and many bad effects too. You are in the best position to size up what medications make sense and what may be causing a problem or no longer a priority or meeting a need.”
To be clear, Dr. Marie is not against prescription medication in general. She is trained as an internal medicine physician and has relied on medications to treat many serious and not so serious illnesses and conditions.
Her concern isn’t with the use of medication to treat a specific disease or condition. Her concern is when someone is prescribed multiple medications to treat multiple conditions and doesn’t consider the consequences of the combination as a whole.
To make matters worse, medications may not be stopped even though the condition may no longer exist or the medication is no longer needed. And of course there is the concern that some medications cause side effects leading to the treatment of these new side effects with even more medication.
“It is all about balancing the risks or burdens of medication versus the benefits, not unlike balancing a scale,” she explained. “As we age, the scale typically tips toward greater burden or risk with each medicine we take. And the more medicine we take, the greater the scale tips.”
Dr. Marie is a doctor, author and former ABC news medical contributor and founder of the Savard System — her six-step system for managing your healthcare. In addition to ABC news, her work has been covered by dozens of major media outlets including Oprah, The View, CNN, NBC and CBS, Good Morning America and ABC World News.
Her lifelong passion is to help people take charge of their health decisions. She has cared for seniors all of her practicing career and has a special appreciation for their extraordinary strength and also their special vulnerability.
In her keynote, Why you should worry about all the medications your parent or loved one is taking and what you can do about it, Dr. Marie will share both personal and patient stories and offer concrete steps you can take right now to help simplify a loved one’s medications and treat what matters. Whether a caregiver, adult child, grandchild or even partner, this presentation will help you simplify a loved one’s medication mix so they can survive and even thrive.
To learn more about bringing Dr. Marie’s life-affirming and empowering message to your community or conference, contact me at 503-699-0531 or barbara@speakwellbeing.com
BONUS: Get 5 Steps to Simplifying Medications and Treating What Matters at AskDrMarie.com
Until next time, take care of yourself for your well being and those you love.
Yours truly,
Barbara
The Speak Well Being Group is a specialized speakers bureau, focusing on speakers for hospital-sponsored community events, healthcare organizations, nurses, conferences and women’s groups.
Our speakers are hand-selected. They are not only experts in their fields, they connect with their audiences while bringing them life-changing information, smiles of recognition and ultimately a sense of well being and hope.
Finding the perfect keynote speaker for your special event or conference is my personal passion, not just once, but year after year. It brings me great joy to know that your audience was delighted and moved by the speaker we selected together. I’m committed to making the process easy, pleasant and fun.
