"Earth Momma" a jacket for Matthew Browning

This a guest blog by Matthew Browning explaining his jacket story...

I was asked well over 50 times, maybe over 100, at HIMSS12 about my incredible Regina Holliday Jacket titled “Earth Momma”. As a member of “The Walking Gallery” I dutifully stopped, each and every single time, to share the story behind this powerful and provocative piece of wearable art. I wear it proudly, share it proudly and and eternally grateful for the voice it has brought to two very poignant moments in my life.

My response became consistent over time, building the story that lead to this jacket and finishing with the pictures of the people involved in these artworks. Due to the incredible responses received when relating this story, I have decided to write it down so that even more people may learn from it.

My name is Matthew Browning, I am a nurse, a nurse practitioner to be precise. But more, so much more than that, I am a husband, a father, a human and a caregiver to people, industry and our environment. I do not tolerate inhumanity, abuse, bullying or elitist disregard from our healthcare system, our industry leaders or our government. I champion the underdog, empower the patients and care for all equally from the indigent to the VIP. My story of “Earth Momma” goes as follows:

Hello, and thank you for asking about this jacket. It was painted by Regina Holliday, a well-known patient advocacy artist, who paints vignettes of a patient story on the jackets  and labcoats of doctors, CEOs and patients. I am one of the fortunate few who have two   of Regina’s jackets, and this one depicts the story of my wife, Phoebe, and our second birth story. My first jacket is called “Both of Them” and it depicts the very traumatic story of our first birth experience, the birth of our son AJ, 9 weeks early while we were traveling in Florida. We live in Connecticut. In THAT jacket there is an image showing the moment that my wife is being wheeled into the operating room. See, we presented into an ER in Florida on a Friday night because my wife wasn’t doing well, shortness of breath, swelling and just not doing well. We figured they would adjust a med or two and off we’d go, but no, they determined that she was pre-eclamptic and that they were going to “take the baby” right then and there. I was able to impress upon them that, as I say when telling this story, that she was a very complicated patient and if they cut her, they’d likely kill her, and we needed her history and chart from Yale’s High-risk pregnancy clinic in Connecticut. At 5 am on a Saturday morning we received an inch thick fax which informed, impressed and instilled a modicum of fear in the delivering surgeon. She wisely increased the team size and off to the operating theatre we walked. Now the scene from “Both of Them” shows the gurney being wheeled away with my wife on it and the Doctor turning to me, saying to me, “I have two very complicated patients here and if things go bad in there-Who’s my priority?” I explain while relating this story, that my knees went weak, I lost my breath and responded “Both Of Them”!

(Readers can see that story here http://reginaholliday.blogspot.com/2011/06/both-of-them.html)  (I’ve learned to add here- and they are now both doing very well :-)

I continue- So we are part of “The Walking Gallery” and there are about 130 of us. So, this past fall, at Matthew Holt’s Health 2.0 Conference in San Francisco, Regina called for “The Walking Galery” members to please show up and wear our jackets. well, sadly, I had to tell her “No Way!” “this would be totally inappropriate” and explain that this was only due to Phoebe being only a month away from delivering our SECOND child and I just could not, in good conscience, wear THAT jacket- No Way!  So, I explain, that Regina in all her wisdom simply suggested that I come to Health 2.0 and strip so she could paint me another jacket. I thought she was kidding, so when I saw her at Health 2.0 she said “take it off” and I said ‘Huh”? Regina said, I told you bring your jacket and I’d paint it... Whew! I was relieved, yet couldn’t part with one half of my only custom made suit, even for such an awesome artwork. However, I asked around and found out Macy’s had a clearance rack two blocks away, and lo and behold, destiny stepped in and had one that was a perfect fit! I presented that jacket to Regina who asked me to update her on the current story and I explained. “OMG, she (Phoebe) is doing so good! We have this huge organic garden, our own chickens for eggs, we are exercising, have a world-class medical team that collaborates and has all of her data, they check her like every two weeks and she is just beautiful, glowing, radiant- a real Earth Momma”

And so, I say as I spin around so they can REALLY look at the jacket, THIS one is called “Earth Momma”. Many are momentarily speechless, some in tears, some in awe but EVERY single person who has heard that story, and seen this jacket, is never the same. I then implore them to look up “The Walking Gallery” on Google and to keep their eyes open for other jackets from it, because EVERY one of them has a powerful patient story behind it. I thank them for their interest, show them pictures (of AJ now almost 4 years old and Beaumont now at 4 months) and I depart with a little bit of their love, their understanding and their hearts as a part of me- and I leave a little bit of my family, our story and Regina’s love with them. I am honored to be a part of Regina’s art and I am so very privileged to have Regina’s art, vision, compassion and love as a part of me. That’s my story, and I’m stickin’ to it. Peace and Love, Matthew (and Phoebe and AJ and Beau)

PS. Here is a interview while I am painting Matthew's jacket it is about data access, but I thought it a cool addition to the post...

Amy Romano's Jacket: Near Miss Mom

If you have ever seen me paint, you are probably quite aware I don’t tend to sketch.  I don’t believe in a do-over, and I do accept organic change within a piece.

I use pigment and brushes and look within, and then begin the painting.  My mind is sort of like that scene in Inception where the landscape changes and morphs into the finished design.   But before I design, I must SEE.  I close my eyes and look back and sometimes sideways or forwards, to find those pictures that create the image; that tell the story.  I see the images roll by like some kind of frantic calliope.  “That one,” I say.  “I will use that dart I played with as a child within this painting.  I will use those warm comfy socks upon her chilled and bloodless feet.”

And so I paint, often on site, within a swarming crowd or upon a city street or at a busy conference.  And I see them out of the corner of my eye: the watching ones.  My peripheral sight warns my animal mind of impending attack or possible collaboration.  My intellectual mind says all those reassuring things.  “Don’t worry they are only watching.”  Occasionally I will spin around upon those too close at hand.  My nose slightly flaring, my eyes dilated.  I see everything.

The eyes are so important. 

Anyone who studies health and medicine must greatly depend on their eyes and the eyes of those they care for.  They depend on their vision to accurately diagnose patients and to foresee impending problems.  I remember Fred’s eyes before they closed forever.  Such beautiful eyes, when they looked at me through love, I could fall forever in those black depths. And they were such scary eyes when they constricted as tightly as a python through a haze of opiates.

Sometimes I focus on the scary eyes.  And that phrase heard on television time and time again echoes in my mind: “Pupils-fixed-and-dilated.  Pupils-fixed-and-dilated.” It rolls off my tongue, like letters recited by a child: “l-m-n-o-p.”  It has been said so often together that it has become one word.

But let us dissect this.  Pupils fixed: not responding to light.  Dilated that was nine days ago when Near Miss Mom gave birth to her baby.

For this is a jacket story.  And I want you to look into these eyes. 

This jacket is a story of birth and consequence: the telling assisted by a midwife.  This is @midwifeamy’s jacket or as her local friends know her Amy Romano.

I met @midwifeamy on Twitter on September 14^th 2009.  I enjoyed her tweets about woman’s causes and childbirth.  She is a powerful patient advocate.  I met her in real life about nine months later.  We were on the same patient panel at Health 2.0 Goes to Washington.  I told Amy I would blog my birth stories sometime soon.  But time and life got away with us and my Isaac’s story remained untold.

You see when Fred went to the first hospital where we fared so badly, I was already familiar with it, as I delivered Isaac there.   In January of 2006, I was trying to maintain my pregnancy.  I had begun pre-term labor before Thanksgiving, and was carefully watching for contractions.  My OB told me that as long as I drank water constantly and didn’t lift anything I should be able to make it to 36 weeks. 

In late January, I woke to find Freddie sick and I needed to go to my OB appointment.  So I took the bus and then the train to my appointment, where I was told that I was beginning to dilate but had not dropped.  I took the train and the bus back home to find Freddie running a 104-degree temperature.  I called the pediatrician to make an appointment.  They fit him in that afternoon and told us he had a bad case of the flu.  While at that appointment I felt the contractions begin.  So we drove across town to the OB, who determined I had dilated quite a bit more, so he recommended I go to the hospital.

In rush hour traffic my worried husband and my sick little boy, drove me to the hospital where they deposited me on the curb.  I waddled in the hospital by myself and went to stand in the line for submitting insurance information.  After triaging me they said my blood pressure was too high to walk around as I had done in my last labor.  I was told to lie on a gurney in the labor triage as they waited for a room to open up.  After enduring few hours of ever increasing contractions with no relief via movement or distracting company, I was finally transferred to labor and delivery.  I had already made it vey clear during the entire process I wanted natural childbirth.

As I labored without my husband or a friend to advocate for me, I saw something from the corner of my eye.  A nurse was doing something. I whipped my head around and asked, “What are you doing to my line?”  She looked over at me nonchalantly and said, “I am adding pitocin to speed up labor.”  “No, you are not!” I said.  “I had my first son in five hours and I will have this one in less and don’t you dare touch my line.”  She left in huff and I was once again alone in the room.  Everything happened very fast after that.  Fred finally arrived, as my mother-in-law was able to drive up and watch our sick little boy.  Within thirty minutes my water broke and we had Isaac.  His face crinkled in dismay at being born and Fred immediately said he looked like a little old man.  Fred was right.  Looking at Isaac was like looking at miniature version of my father.

They took Isaac to the NICU, but he seemed to be doing pretty well considering he was barely 36 weeks.  Fred looked at me lovingly and said, “I brought you something to read.”  It was Stephen King’s book: Cell.  I loved that book, and I agreed with its premise and thought I would never own a cell phone.

The next day the NICU staff said they wanted to send Isaac home.  He was slightly underweight with an elevated bilirubin.  I was upset.  His brother was a 102 degrees and vomiting.  Our tiny one bedroom was completely contaminated.  I had not even been allowed home yet to clean.  The staff suggested we could always go to a hotel.  I walked away and called the pediatrician’s office.  A couple of hours later the NICU director told me, “I don’t know who your pediatrician is but she just tore me a new one.  Your son may stay for two days.”  I checked out and went home.  I ate some take out, expressed some milk and then began disinfecting the apartment, as my mother-in-law comforted Freddie and my Fred went back to work.

We brought home Isaac to a clean apartment and little Freddie wore a facemask for a few days to prevent infecting his new little brother.  That was our birth story, and though it was fraught with frustration it does not compare to the story depicted on Amy’s Jacket for the Walking Gallery.

Near Miss Mom almost died.  She almost died after delivering nine days before because she almost bled to death in an ER.  She waited for an MRI and bled.  She waited for a pump to express her milk, and found there were no pumps in the ER.   Her friend left her side to go to a local drug store to buy a pump.  Then Near Miss Mom expressed and bled some more.  She bled so much that it welled above her thighs and filled her sheets, twice, while in the ER.  She bled so much it required 11 bags of blood to save her.   And she was awake and realizing all of this until it was almost too late.  And the last thing her eyes saw as she was going into surgery was the surgeon and nurses all lined up and staring at her.

This is the story delivered to me.  I had no pictures of the players, only Amy’s words to guide me.  I began to paint and I focused on the eyes.  Near Miss Mom’s eyes stare at the viewer as she is bleeding to death.  Her face is serene, as though there is so little energy left for the fight. 

The lights above have become bulls-eyes and a dart is imbedded in one of them.  Below the dart, a medical practitioner stands behind a tray of tools.  His eyes are shocked and staring at the gushing blood.  Beside him stands another man, who seems to swallow in disbelief.  Beside him stands the woman, who eyes dart to the side as if laying blame upon the tall man to the right.

To the right the surgeon stands.  His arms are crossed defensively and he stares with uncertainty into space.  And anchoring the red bulls-eyes on the ceiling into the composition, the floor pools with blood.  And this blood is so bright, so present; it almost forms another player in the scene.

I dare you to make sense of this painting if you took the eyes away.  If those little blobs of white and dark were gone would this be the same tale?  The eye is a window to the soul.  I looked within and I saw Near Miss Mom.   And at The Walking Gallery I held her in my arms.  As our eyes filled with tears, I could tell… I had gotten her eyes just right.

It's a Spiral, Not a Bulls-eye: Liz Scherer's Jacket

I wake up most mornings to @lizscherer’s tweets.  In the early morning every weekday I find this fiery re-head faithfully tweeting.  She describes herself as a “Flasher, interactive health wordsmith, journo/reporter, health 2.0'er, women's health advocate former N'Yorker gone DC, reveler, rebel.”  More often than not, I find Liz Scherer talking about women’s health.  She posts some wonderfully controversial articles.  I was so glad when she agreed to be part of the gallery because I knew she could wear an arresting visual image filled with controversy.  And I am so glad we had a chance to talk on the phone and design that visual together.

This is the jacket I painted for Liz: “It is a Spiral, not a Bulls-eye.“

This jacket is very much about a woman’s right to healthy medical choices and the current challenges she faces in attaining the right to choose her path.  I have often felt during this past year that women’s health has been placed before bull-eye and a lot of folks are having fun using women for target practice.  In fact, I get very frustrated when I see a bull-eye used in a health provider power point set.   

Just a few weeks ago I was honored to take part in a Safety Leaders/TMIT High Performer Webinar called “Engaging, Activating, and Partnering with Suppliers as Performance Partners” on May 19^th 2011.  In that webinar Paul E. McGann, MD CMS Deputy Chief Medical Officer Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) presented a newly created Patient at the Center Info graphic.  As the info graphic assembled in a step-by-step process during the power-point presentation, I became increasingly concerned that this was the wrong visual for the concept of patient-centered care.  The patient wasn’t being centered; the patient was surrounded.  I soon realized that my frustration with such a visual symbol was two-fold.  First, I felt the bulls-eye represented attack.  And secondly, it represented doing something to patients, not with them.

They should have used a spiral.

A spiral is the path; it is the journey.  I walk it with you, and do not do it to you.  It represents life.  It represents women.  In this painting the spiral is a triskelion.  A triskelion is a symbol with three interlocked spirals.  This symbol has been used through the ages to represent the stages of a woman’s life and the three trimesters of pregnancy. 

Within this painting we a have a triskelion symbol upon a sacrificial rock.  The spirals are so obscured by the bodies of the sacrificial offering, that it seems like the swirls have become bulls-eyes.


To the left side a maiden stands.  She tells the viewer to be quiet as presses one finger to her lips while the other hand clasps her birth control pills.  She is worried her choices will be taken from her.

In the center stands the mother.  She holds up one finger with her right hand and three fingers with her left.  Her belly is distended with pregnancy, yet she has a freshly stapled cesarean section incision.  She represents the very scary ratio of how many women are currently having their children by cesarean in this country: One in three.

To the far right is the crone.  She seems so young within her robe. Surely she is not a crone?  Our culture tends to equate the crone with the ancient and the haggard.  When in actuality the crone is the post-menopausal woman, with her own drives desires and medical concerns.  Here she holds a human heart in one hand and alka seltzer in the other.  She represents all the women who have heart attacks in this country and are sent home to treat their “indigestion.”

In front and beneath the female sacrifice is a cthulu-style beast.  Its tendrils wrap around the women as it prepares to pull them down into the deep.  Upon it’s head it a symbol.  It is the rod of Asclepius.  But in this representation, the snake is slowly uncoiling and the combination of rod and snake assumes the form of a symbol for the holy dollar. 

I am honored to paint this jacket for Liz.  She is so powerful and wise.  She writes of the daily struggles of all the “crones” among us.  It is so important that she is out there representing all of us with her powerful voice.  And I am so glad we are walking the spiral together.