Patient Navigation: A Call to Action (Assisting Patients in Receiving Speedy Treatment‪)‬

Patient navigator" is the new buzzword in health care. Patient navigators assist patients in overcoming barriers to the timely receipt of health care services. Although there are only a few published studies that describe or evaluate current programs that employ patient navigators (see Dohan & Schrag, 2005, for a review of the literature), the concept of patient navigation is presumed to be a promising strategy to reduce racial and ethnic disparities in health outcomes. On June 29, 2005, President Bush signed into law the Patient Navigator Outreach and Chronic Disease Prevention Act of 2005 (P.L. 109-18). The new law authorizes the appropriation of $25 million over five years for demonstration programs to provide patient navigator services to improve health outcomes. As of June 2006, Congress had not yet appropriated funds, but its chief sponsor, Senator Robert Menendez (D-NJ), remained sanguine about the law's prospects for an appropriation in 2006 or in the future, given its strong bipartisan support (personal communication with Karissa Willhite, legislate aide to Senator Menendez, June 1, 2006). As this act represents a large, coordinated federal commitment to patient navigation and will likely lead to establishing standards of practice, it is imperative that social workers understand the new law and what is at stake for social work. It also is essential for social workers to reflect on what is known about current patient navigator programs and initiatives so that they can anticipate issues that may arise, help shape the discussion, and assure a place at the table for social workers as new federally sponsored programs are developed and implemented. Accordingly, in this article I review the evidence from current patient navigation programs, describe the provisions of the new law, and identify the key issues that require proactive attention by social workers.