Introduction
Healthcare professionals should be equipped with adequate competencies to meet their patients’ needs. The targeted individuals might be from different cultural and lingual backgrounds. Adequate resources such as translation software, dictionaries, and apps should also be available. Different professionals can also be involved to support the process. This paper describes how language can be addressed when providing medical services.
Personal Experience
As a nurse practitioner (NP), I have encountered different scenarios that have resulted in poor health outcomes due to the language barrier. The outstanding one occurred when our team was treating a patient of Asian descent. The individual was unable not express herself in English, French, Spanish, or Chinese. This was also the same case for her relatives and guardians. Throughout the care delivery process, most of the patients’ needs could not be met effectively.
The institution had a number of interpretation services to deal with the problem of the language barrier. Practitioners were encouraged to install different apps that could translate spoken words. The second one was the inclusion of French and Spanish translators. Each group had several members who could speak fluently in different languages. These approaches made it easier for the facility to offer superior medical services. However, the identified case could not be supported using the existing resources.
The first pro of these resources is that they can empower practitioners to meet the needs of patients from Spanish, English, American, and French backgrounds. They also resonate with the expectations of many practitioners. Additionally, such resources can strengthen the concept of teamwork (Watts et al., 2017). On the other hand, they are incapable of addressing the needs of patients from Asian, African, and Russian backgrounds. The existing apps cannot spell out most of the words pronounced by different patients. Such gaps should, therefore, be addressed to prevent a similar scenario.
Action Plans
Several actions can be undertaken to remove language barriers to competent care. The first one is introducing advanced apps to translate spoken words. The use of modern technologies will improve every communication process (Watts et al., 2017). The apps should also be available to both patients and practitioners. The second one is encouraging the facility’s managers to recruit more practitioners from diverse lingual backgrounds. Consequently, the institution’s workforce will reflect the demographics of the surrounding community.
For professionals who are not healthcare workers, several actions can be considered to improve communication. The first one is introducing superior technologies to transform the way information is shared (Green & Nze, 2017). Secondly, multidisciplinary teams can be formed to deal with this problem. This concept will ensure that more professionals and parents are involved throughout the care delivery process.
Response
Your post is meaningful because it encourages nurse practitioners to improve their cultural competencies in order to meet their patients’ needs. It also supports the use of appropriate strategies such as advanced technologies and interpreters to address the challenge of lingual diversity (Green & Nze, 2017). Teams comprised of professionals from different cultural backgrounds can also deal with this issue.
I believe that the arguments presented in your post resonate with my experiences as an NP. I have encountered several scenarios whereby the language barrier resulted in poor health outcomes. The use of multidisciplinary teams is also an evidence-based approach that can deliver meaningful results (Watts et al., 2017). An alternate strategy for dealing with the language barrier is encouraging patients’ relatives and friends to be part of the treatment process. This strategy will ensure that the needs of different patients are addressed. In conclusion, personalized care delivery will be developed to achieve positive results.
References
Green, A. R., & Nze, C. (2017). Language-based inequity in health care: Who is the “poor historian”? AMA Journal of Ethics, 19(3), 263-271. Web.
Watts, K. J., Meiser, B., Zilliacus, E., Kaur, R., Taouk, M., Girgis, A.,…Kissane, D. W. (2017). Communicating with patients from minority backgrounds: Individual challenges experienced by oncology health professionals. European Journal of Oncology Nursing, 26, 83-90. Web.