Millions of previously uninsured Americans have been gaining health insurance under the Affordable Care Act, leading to a greater need for the merge of interpreting services in healthcare systems. Understandably, there has been an increase in adult patients who speak a foreign language; interpreters have played an essential role in generating positive healthcare outcomes for adult foreign language patients.
In this blog, we will discuss how interpretation services can assist people who work in a health care setting.
Importance Of Professional Interpreters
Professional medical interpreters are a must when it is necessary to work with and overcome linguistic barriers in the medical field. Patient care inevitably suffers when patients and doctors have insufficient communication. In fact, studies have also shown that if language barriers between doctors and adult patients are not conquered, misdiagnosis and inappropriate treatment are far more likely to occur.
According To Karliner et. al, “Use of professional interpreters is associated with improved clinical care more than is use of ad hoc interpreters, and professional interpreters appear to raise the quality of clinical care for LEP patients to approach or equal that for patients without language barriers.”
Ultimately, poor interpreting, whether it is performed by an ad hoc interpreter or a family member, can lead to unfortunate medical mistakes with serious consequences. In healthcare every second counts, so doctors should not have to waste time struggling to communicate, especially if there is an affordable alternative. Professional medical interpreting benefits all involved parties and can save lives.
Video Remote Interpreting: Bridging The Cultural Gap
Medical interpreters can help doctors work towards bridging the cultural gap between doctors and patients. There are many rural areas in the country where patients have little access to language mediators. Video Remote Interpreting (VRI) systems are a growing trend and serve as the best alternative for pediatric patients in rural areas. Hospitals and healthcare systems find increased value in VRI systems, as they’re a convenient, flexible alternative to an in-person interpreting approach. With the increase in smartphone usage, there are more opportunities for telephonic interpreting than ever before.
Reducing Patient Stress
A large part of this initiative is focused on reducing patient stress. It’s obvious that trips to the hospital or doctor’s office can be very stressful for some people, so now imagine that you have a difficult time attempting to understand basic information and documents written in a foreign language. Extra stressful isn’t it? It is absolutely essential that a patient can speak to a medical professional in a language that they are comfortable with. This will vastly improve communication between patient and doctor, which can help make the patient feel more secure.
iTi | Medical Interpretation Services
iTi’s dedicated and experienced teams offer a wide range of multilingual solutions for domestic and global corporations in a variety of industries. With our expansive resources, you can take advantage of communication services on a global scale, creating, managing, and distributing your content in any format. You are welcome to contact us to request a quote for the next situation which requires a translation or interpreter.
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