Effect of Spanish Language Concordant Care on Shared Decision‐Making in Pediatric Otolaryngology

Objective Shared decision‐making allows patients and physicians to make choices together by incorporating clinical expertise and patient preference. We sought to describe preferences in medical decision‐making and the degree of shared decision‐making among Spanish‐speaking caregivers receiving pediatric Otolaryngology care. We hypothesized that language‐concordant encounters would have higher shared decision‐making scores. Methods Cross‐sectional study of Spanish‐speaking caregivers at a tertiary regional pediatric academic center undergoing consultation with pediatric otolaryngology (May 2022–February 2024). Care was provided in either a language‐concordant setting or a language–discordant setting. Following patient encounters in which a decision was made, Spanish‐speaking caregivers completed the Control Preferences Scale to determine their preferred roles in medical decision‐making (active, active‐collaborative, collaborative, passive‐collaborative, or passive) and the Shared Decision‐Making Questionnaire (scored 0–100) to assess perceived decision‐making. Fisher's exact test, Kruskal–Wallis test, and the Mann–Whitney U test were used for analysis, as appropriate. Results One‐hundred‐fifty‐six caregivers were enrolled. The mean age of the caregivers was 38.14 years (SD = 7.38) and most participants were mothers. The active‐collaborative medical decision‐making role was the most favored (41.4%) while 7.1% preferred a completely active and 14.3% a completely passive role. Language‐concordant encounters had higher scores on the Shared Decision‐Making Questionnaire (median [IQR]: 100 [88.89, 100.00]) than language‐discordant encounters (median [IQR]: 94.44 [82.22, 100.00]; p = 0.003). Conclusion More shared decision‐making was observed among Spanish‐speaking caregivers receiving language‐concordant care compared to language‐discordant care, many of whom preferred an active‐collaborative decision‐making style. Language‐concordant care appears to facilitate an environment for shared decision‐making to thrive during surgical consultation in pediatric otolaryngology. Level of Evidence This is a level III study due to the cross‐sectional design in conjunction with the use of validated tools and a focus on comparative analysis within the study population.