I
nterpret America welcomed interpreters from all six continents and all
sub-disciplines in Reston, Virginia, on June 14 and 15, 2013. The main
thread across court, medical, business, and conference interpreting
was the need for interpreters and translators to be responsive to new
realities in their sectors. Here is the main message around the urgent
need to update our focus in medical interpreting:
In healthcare, more and more communication and information takes
place when the patient and care team are NOT in the same room.
For every interaction that a patient has in the same room with a care
provider, he has over a dozen interactions with the pharmacy, lab,
medical records, financial services,
insurance company, surgery
coordinator, appointment clerks, and so on via phone, email, or texting.
And more and more frequently the patient must access an application
or information via the internet.
We, as interpreters and interpreter managers, are wasting our time
arguing about whether to support clinic visits by remote or in-person
modality. We need to map and then support all of the communication
and information pathways that the patient is now dependent upon, and
provide language support at all of these interfaces. There is plenty of
work to do; we need to move over to where the work is!
Please contact Linda Golley for information on how to map and support
healthcare communication and information pathways:
Medical Interpreter
Wake-up Call at
Interpret America
By LINDA GOLLEY, MANAGER INTERPRETER SERVICES, UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON MEDICAL CENTER
6
Texas Association of Healthcare Interpreters and Translators
