The Importance Of Health Care Practitioners Being Aware Of This Largely Neglected Problem

All languages are important and realizing it will make you become a stronger, more diverse human being. We need take make an effort not only for ourselves but for other citizens living in the United States who don’t speak English; we need to make them feel welcomed into our country. Marjorie Agosín described that,”here in the United States, where I have lived since I was a young girl, the solitude of exile makes me feel that so little is mine, that not even the sky has the same constellations, the trees and the fauna the same names or sounds, or the rubbish the same smell. These are the dilemmas of one who writes in Spanish and lives in translation”(Agosin 599). Agosín has lived in the United States for quite some time now, yet still feels like she is living a life through “translation”. She should not feel this way, Agosin should feel apart of our country and feel as if she is a citizen. It is important for us to take a stand now to make language become apart of the curriculum within our school systems starting in Kindergarten, so that our children have a more diverse life filled with opportunities. One thing we know about the future for sure is that we will still have our knowledge about language, but it is how we use that knowledge that will depict how we will succeed in life and as a

Establishing effective communication with the patient is a critical factor in promoting patient quality care. Good communication is fundamental when providing safe and effective care at the beside in order to increase the quality of patient care. One of the many communicative barriers that exists between patients and the healthcare team are language barriers. Language barriers are considered an initial problem of translation or code-switching. Individuals who speak different languages require a certain code breaker in order to facilitate effective communication (Gregg & Saha, 2007). Furthermore, language barriers may hinder the quality of patient care and interfere with optimal clinical outcomes. According to Happ et al., 2011, nurses have the unique responsibility to engage in communication with patients and have control over the timing and method of communication. Evidenced based interventions such as communication boards are needed to improve nurses’ communication skills in order to achieve effective communication.

The first article discussed about the issue of language barrier between workers and clients. Language barrier is a serious issue to human services as it has a high impact on one’s life. This became a problem due to the low access of interpreters for individuals and the only way to communicate was by uneffective description of the current situation. By having limited amount of interpreters especially in the medical field, it lowers an individual to seek and find cure for their true needs. “When the girlfriend and her mother repeated the term, the non–Spanish-speaking paramedics took it to mean “intoxicated”; the intended meaning was “nauseated.” In this example, it shows how language barrier can cause wrongful interpretations for patients to receive the help they truly need. The model type of service delivery

“No Habla English”. “21 million people living in the United States cannot speak English. Citizens are not just speaking Spanish, but Chinese and Russian are rising fast.” (U.S. Bureau of Census, 2009) To force a citizen to speak a new language is discrimination. Non-English speaking citizens and immigrants that are without good English skills will fall academically, in the judicial system and when receiving proper medical care.

In 2004 my grandmother and I moved from Haiti to United States without a speck of English in our language. After few years living in the states, my grandma started to get ill and she had to seek monthly medical assistance. At the time, my mother was working multiple jobs and I was a full time undergrad student that lived on college campus. Our busy schedule posed a challenge for us to bring grandma to her medical appointments. Most times it was hard for us to find someone to go with her and assist her with language translation. When it was time for her to go by herself, the health providers would have trouble finding a professional translator on the spot to assist my grandma. This became a repetitive problem and my grandma’s case was not getting any better. If she had the ability to communicate with her provider using her own language, she would have been able to be more expressive about her symptoms and the doctors would have assisted her to her needs. Just like my grandma, many people that speaks little to no English, are having trouble interpreting their medical diagnosis and communicating with their healthcare providers.

To have quality of care within the health care system, effective communication is needed. Barriers arise when effective communication is not meet, patients with limited English proficiency are at risk for misdiagnosis, poor treatment decisions, trust between provider and patient is not there, and patients to not adhere to treatment plans and follow up if they do not understand what they need to do (Regenstein, Mead, Muessig, & Huang, 2009).

A common joke says “What do you call someone who speaks two languages?” in which the person being asked the question would usually respond with “bilingual.” It goes on to ask about those who speak three or four languages, but then there is a kicker. “What does one call someone who only speaks one language?” to which the punch line is “an American.” According to the 2006 General Social Survey, only 25 percent of American adults are fluent in a foreign language, while only 7 percent cite the source of this education to formal schooling (Devlin 1). Large amounts of evidence point to the benefits of being multilingual. Although the United States has a few laws that help immigrants assimilate through dual language programs, there is little to be

Language contributes to health disparities because a study shows the relationship between being proficient in English and health-related behaviors, disease prevalence, and receipt of health care services among Hispanics. (DuBard, & Gizlice, 2008). Language contrition to disparities creates health issues for the Hispanic population because more than 1 in 10 US residents speak Spanish at home, and of them lack the ability to speak English well. (DuBard, & Gizlice, 2008). Being unable to speak English contributes to the everyday challenges that the

Language is a very important part of culture. It’s the method of communication between people, it’s a comforting feeling to hear your own language, and it defines who you are as a person. In the Hispanic culture the language spoken is Spanish. Spanish is such a popular language in the united states that many people become bilingual to be able to speak English and Spanish. "Spanish is the most spoken non-English language in U.S. homes, even among non-Hispanics. A record 37.6 million persons ages 5 year and older speak Spanish at home, according to an analysis of the 2011 American Community Survey by the Pew Research Center” When visiting a different culture, the language barriers are scary, I recently visited Mexico and not knowing what people were saying was frightening, Luckily Spanish is common so it wasn’t hard to find someone to translate. I remember feeling so warm inside hearing someone who speaks English talking, it was comforting to

Lor et al. (2016) examined the growing problem of language barriers for patients in the United States and around the world. The use of interpreters is often the solution to bridge the gap between languages. The purpose of this study was to examine patient perception of interpreter services.The population for this study included 10 English proficient Hmong patients and 10 Spanish speaking patients. The participants ranged from age 33 to 75 years old. The intervention was that poor quality interpretation could lead to poor relationships among patients, interpreters and providers. In addition poor interpretation could end up in the patient being unable to follow through with treatment plans. Lastly, poor quality interpretation can lead to emotional distress for patients. Comparison was that patients have expectations on how the

Patients with LEP struggle to communicate with providers, receive inappropriate diagnosis and treatment, experience low quality care, has poor patient satisfaction, decrease comprehension of medication instructions and compliance to the regimen, go to fewer follow up visits, and has a poorer health outcomes (Shi, Lebrun, & Tsai, 2009). Moreover, with the use of professional interpreters, the length of stay and readmission rates can be reduced (Gray & Hardt, 2017).

Effective communication with patients is critical to the safety and quality care. From the last two decades ,number of researches has been conducted on the impact of language barrier on health and healthcare. It is observed that language barriers are the main cause of medical errors, complication and adverse event. But due to data limitations ,limited researches on impacts of language barrier has been conducted in Canadian setting. However, the researches conducted on other countries on the impact of language barrier on quality of care is applicable in the Canadian context. Some researches shows that there are several barrier which affect quality of care and patient safety. Now, researches has begun to know the complexity of language, culture, race, health literacy that may affect patient care. Current approaches are moved towards the knowledge of risk of language barrier rather than implementation of effective, evidence informed strategies.

Jacobs, E. A., Shepard, D. S., Suaya, J. A., Stone, E. (2004). Overcoming language barriers in health care: costs and benefits of interpreter services. American Journal of Public Health, 94 (5), 866-869.

To communicate seems easy enough to most of us. We have been doing this from the moment we were born. We expressed ourselves with grunts, moans, crying, smiling and yelling. We started communicating even before we made words with our nonverbal forms of communication. Communication is important. It allows individuals to share information and messages in the form of ideas and feelings (Giger, 2013). It gives us direction and allows us to interact with others. Can you image getting the entertainment system in parts in the mail with no instructions as to how to put it together? It is essential that we all communicate effectivity in order to ensure the best quality of care. Language barriers threaten the patient safety and overall quality of care of these individuals. By having efficient practices in place it will lower those risks and increase quality care.

English might not be the official language of the American nation; however, every immigrant knows that it is the language of the North American country and that it