FEATURE ARTICLE
Interpreters and the medical practice.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau’s year 2000 census, almost 47 million people or 18% of the U.S, population spoke a language other than English at home. One study concluded that an estimated 10 million people in the United States are identified as hard of hearing, meaning they have difficulty hearing normal conversations and close [...]
Medical
Language Barriers to Health Care
A 12-year-old Latino boy arrived at a Boston emergency department with dizziness anda headache. The patient, whom I’ll call Raul, had limited proficiency in English; his mother spoke no English, and the attending physician spoke little Spanish. No medical interpreter was available, so Raul acted as his own interpreter. His mother described his symptoms:
“La semana pasada a el le dio mucho mareo y no tenía fiebre ni nada, y la familia por parte de papá todos padecen de diabetes.” (Last week, he had a lot of dizziness, and he didn’t have fever or anything, and his dad’s family all suffer from diabetes.)
“Uh hum,” replied the physician.
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Legal
Language Barriers to Justice
Many of us have experienced the frustration of coming up against a language barrier, whether in a foreign country or right in the United States. Fortunately, these are usually temporary situations. For limited English proficient (LEP) and non-English proficient (NEP) individuals, however, the constant struggle to communicate can seem insurmountable and have serious consequences.
Jong Yeol Lee found this out in January 2008 when police arrived at 3 a.m. at his Virginia home to arrest him on a District of Columbia warrant.
Industry
Translation in Transportation
Transport service plays a huge role in the success of a country or state’s tourism industry. It is also one of the many aspects of tourism that finds professional translation pretty useful. From airline companies to shipping lines to car rental service, anybody involved in the transportation business would get some useful help from professional translation.
Translation
Language Barriers Plague Hospitals
The American Medical Association says making health care providers responsible for the cost of an interpreter is unfair. An AMA survey found that the cost of hiring an interpreter varied from $30 to $300 an hour depending on language and skill level, significantly higher than the payment for a Medicaid office visit, which in many states is from $30 to $50. California passed legislation in 2003 requiring health care providers to make interpreters available to those who need them, says Cindy Ehnes of the state’s Department of Managed Health Care. Otherwise, she says, quality care is clearly “difficult if not impossible.”
