10025 Background: Medical interpreters play a critical role in pediatric oncology beyond translation by guiding conversations, interpreting cultural and emotional cues, and ensuring families with limited English proficiency (LEP) can access medical information. Yet few clinician training resources focus on interpreter-mediated communication. This study aimed to (1) identify communication best practices and challenges from the perspective of professional medical interpreters and (2) develop an educational toolkit for clinicians to promote equitable, patient-centered communication for families with LEP. Methods: We conducted semi-structured individual interviews and a focus group with Spanish medical interpreters from six freestanding children’s hospitals across the United States between 12/2024-10/2025. Verbatim transcripts were thematically analyzed in Dedoose, and resulting themes directly informed creation of an educational toolkit. Results: Sixteen interpreters (15 female, 1 male) who provide in-person interpretation participated. Benefits of in-person professional interpretation included perceiving non-verbal communication cues, serving as patient/family advocates, providing cultural and linguistic tailoring, explaining idiomatic or metaphorical clinical language, and continuity of interpreters across visits. Challenges included fragmented communication across medical teams, limited clinician understanding of cultural nuance, exclusion of parents from conversations, and remote interpreting. Based on these themes, we developed recommendations for clinicians focused on building collaborative relationships with interpreters, allowing time for interpretation, and actively checking patient and family understanding. We then designed a toolkit comprising three resources for clinicians working with interpreters: a badge reference card with a pre-, during-, and post-visit checklist; a decision-making learning module with case-based, first-person scenarios navigating interpreter-mediated encounters; and a self-paced modular course with structured lessons for in-depth learning. Conclusions: Interpreters identified concrete practices that enhance patient-centered care, with particular strengths evident during in-person interpretation, and challenges that undermine equitable communication. These insights informed a clinician-facing educational toolkit to improve interpreter-clinician encounters. Future studies will pilot the toolkit with ongoing, iterative refinement guided by interpreter input.
Kang et al. (Wed,) studied this question.