How Hospitals Can Provide Excellent Medical Interpreting For Patients
Script:
- Communication between patients and caregivers is essential to positive healthcare outcomes. However, access to language services, specifically medical interpreting services, is often difficult for certain communities.
- Oftentimes doctors will ask a patient’s bilingual family member to offer amateur interpreting services. Having a non-certified person like a family member act as an interpreter can have life changing implications and should not be used as an alternative.
- When a hospital doesn’t invest in qualified interpreters, patient health can be put in jeopardy. Here are some key factors to consider when choosing a language service provider:
- Common cases that require medical interpreting
- it is imperative for patients to understand surgery specifics, diagnoses, or details of other procedures when seeking medical care. Interpreting is therefore central to a patient’s well-being.
- One example of how a lack of professional interpreting can lead to tragedy was when a hospital relied on a nine-year old patient’s brother for interpreting, resulting in caregivers providing the wrong treatment and unfortunately killing the patient.
- This case clearly shows a lack of appreciation on the part of the hospital of the importance of keeping patients informed and educated about their medical diagnoses and rights.
- Laws and regulations for medical interpreting services
- According to Title III of the Americans with Disabilities Act, “all private healthcare providers are required to provide interpreting services. The certified interpreters are obligated to work with deaf people as well”.
- Judges take violations of the ADA very seriously, as seen when FedEx was fined $100,000 for not providing sign language interpreting services for a deaf employee.
- For hospitals to avoid legal action and prioritize the safety of patients, they should use the following steps as a guide:
- 1. Research both local and nationwide translation/interpretation agencies to find a reliable provider to partner with
- 2. Identify high volume foreign languages spoken by patients
- 3. Assemble a team to devise a budget to set aside for the procurement of language services to satisfy ADA requirements.
- 4. Ensure that agencies you decide to partner with properly vet their interpreters.
- 5. Create Interpreting/translation protocols to make sure employees are well-informed of current guidelines
About Language Connections:
Language Connections is one of the top language service companies in the US. Over the last 30 years, we’ve focused on providing the best business translation services, interpreting services, as well as interpreter training and customized language training programs. In addition to top-tier corporate language training, we offer certified corporate interpreters and professional business translation services in 200+ languages. Our network includes linguists with backgrounds in all major industries. They’re ready to meet your needs, whether they’re for technical translation services, legal translation, government translation, international development translation, education translation, life sciences translation, or something else. Reach out to us today for a free quote on our cost-efficient and timely translation services, interpreters, or other linguistic services.
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