About one-fifth of adults and children over the age of 5 living in the United States report speaking a language other than English (LOE) at home, with a significant portion of this population also self-reporting limited English proficiency. Pediatric emergency medicine providers are seeing increasing numbers of patients and caregivers in this demographic. Care for these patients can be complicated by miscommunication. Research has consistently shown that patients with LOE experience numerous disparities in emergency department (ED) care, including under-triage, longer lengths of stay, increased revisit rates, increased rates of adverse events, and worse analgesia for pain. Overcoming linguistic barriers is important to provide excellent and equitable care for this population, and studies show that the use of professional interpretation can mitigate these disparities. Although general guidelines for the use of medical interpreters exist, there are special challenges involved in caring for patients in the emergency setting while also communicating with adult caregivers. This article aims to familiarize the emergency medicine provider with issues they will likely encounter in their practice setting, suggestions to mitigate these difficulties, and best practices for collaborating with interpreters in a fast-paced medical setting.
Rojas et al. (Wed,) studied this question.