Preparing for Doctor Visits
Being prepared for doctor visits ensures you'll have productive meetings with your care team. You can ask all the questions on your mind to get the support and information you need.
Below are tips we've found helpful when preparing for doctor's visits:
- Make a list of questions for your care team
- Always ask the most important question first
- Bring a list of your medications
- Know your family history
- Make a list of your prior surgeries and other medical problems
- Bring a friend or family member to take notes or ask to record the session so you can reference it later
Worksheets
Below you will find a set of worksheets designed for you to print and take to doctor’s appointments. Each one contains prompts for information you should be getting from your providers and space for note taking.
Know Before You Go: Abnormal bleeding
Print and take this with you to guide a discussion with your doctor about abnormal bleeding. (This might be with your primary care doctor or your gynecologist).
Know Before You Go: Surgery
Print and take this with you to your appointment with your surgeon (a gynecologic oncologist).
Know Before You Go: Chemotherapy
Print and take this with you to your first appointment with the doctor providing your chemotherapy treatments (a medical oncologist).
Know Before You Go: Radiation
Print and take this with you to your first appointment with the doctor providing your radiation treatments (a radiation oncologist).
If you have comments, questions, or feedback about the worksheets please contact us, or send us an email at: info@ecanawomen.org.
A note about the sources we use for education materials
We believe in providing you with information that you can trust. We take everything into consideration: strong medical evidence and wisdom and knowledge from the community. We also include information from health care providers focused on African American women’s health.
We also want to hear from you. Please feel free to submit information that we might have missed or questions that you would like us to address.