Workforce Language Services

Instructions from your doctor can be confusing enough without adding a language barrier into the equation. So it’s not surprising that bad translations of prescription instructions can lead to dangerous results. What is surprising is that of the prescription companies that provide translations, many use machine-generated translations which only have a 50% accuracy rate.

“It’s something I experience in practice every day,” said Dr. Alejandro Clavier, who works at Esperanza Health Center in Chicago’s Little Village neighborhood on the Southwest Side.

He gave an example of an anemic patient who showed no signs of improved iron levels after taking prescribed supplements. Clavier discovered the patient had been taking only one drop of the supplements instead of the amount that Clavier had prescribed. The patient had received confusing prescription instructions from the pharmacy.

Often misspellings or “Spanglish” in prescriptions can cause confusion, like “poca” (little) instead of “boca,” or “once a day” being misinterpreted as the Spanish “once” which means “eleven.”

Carmen Velasquez, director of the Alivio Medical Center in Pilsen where the majority of patients speak Spanish, believes a machine translation as substitute for a human being is an inappropriate solution.

“It’s health care. If you have the responsibility of human life, you better well know what you are doing and saying,” Velasquez said.

To read the full Chicago Tribune article, click here.

A news story out of Columbia, SC, where the Hispanic population is 14%, reports that Hispanics are not receiving adequate healthcare. Specifically, certain perceived limitations, like having a foreign accent or not knowing a doctor, are preventing Latinos from receiving the care they need.

[Latinos are] three times less likely to have a consistent source of medical care and one and a half times more likely to use the emergency room as a primary source of healthcare. Making unnecessary trips to the emergency room is one of the most common mistakes Hispanics make, and it can cost them hundreds of dollars.

The article report on some recent data from the Pew Hispanic Center:

• 46 percent say they believe their accent contributed to their poor care.
• 43 percent say they believe their inability to pay contributed to their poor care.
• 37 percent say they believe their race or ethnicity caused them to receive poor care.

A group called “Promotoras de Salud” is trying to get information out to the Latino population about where to go when sick and other resources that will help make their experience with health care more successful.

Read the full article here.