词汇大师(Wordmaster)--Medical Interpreters

Broadcast on "Coast to Coast": June 27, 2002
Re-broadcast on VOA News Now: June 30, 2002

AA: I'm Avi Arditti with Rosanne Skirble, and this week on Wordmaster: a special report about the linguistic¹ challenges that health care workers face in the United States as a result of the nation鈥檚 growing immigrant population.

RS: A recent study found that hospitals could lower medical risk and enhance their treatment of immigrant patients by providing interpreters to translate a diagnosis² or procedure. The study involved a survey of patients who did not have medical insurance.

AA: The study was conducted by the Access Project, a resource center in Boston, Massachusetts, for community health initiatives. The center is affiliated³ with Brandeis University.

VOA correspondent Laurie Kassman sums up the findings.

TEXT: Access Project Executive Director Mark Rukavina says the study highlights the advantages language interpreters provide for the patient and the hospital -- and the dangers when they do not.

RUKAVINA: "One of the more troubling findings from our report was that people who needed but did not get interpretation⁴ were much more likely to leave the encounter with the clinicians without a clear understanding of the medication or the instructions or how to pay for the care that they received."

TEXT: The Access Project surveyed four-thousand patients at 23 hospitals in 16 U-S cities, including many who did not speak English well. One in five of those who responded that they did not have an interpreter said they did not understand how to take the medicine they received. Only two percent of those who needed and got a proper interpreter cited this as a problem. Often, immigrant families who speak little English depend on their child or relative who does. But Washington attorney Mara Youdelman of the National Health Law Program says that can create added family tensions and more problems:

YOUDELMAN: "First and foremost, many children do not have the competency in English or medical terminology⁵ to accurately⁶ translate. Secondly⁷, many children are brought in at inappropriate circumstances. For example, a ten-year-old child was asked to translate and explain to his mother that she had just been diagnosed with cancer."

TEXT: Access Project director Mark Rukavina says many hospitals may agree on the need for the service but see the added cost as an obstacle. Ironically, he says, only five U-S states currently take advantage of federal health insurance programs that will subsidize interpreter services for their public hospitals.

Ms. Youdelman says the federal government reminded state health services two years ago of the availability of federal funding.

YOUDELMAN: "We still believe there is an educational effort that needs to be undertaken so that states are aware of the federal reimbursement⁸ and make them understand that providing interpretation up front can reduce health care costs in the long term."

TEXT: Ms. Youdelman's law center recently studied 14 community health programs that use interpreters to see how handle the problem.

Mr. Rukavina says many urban hospitals and clinics that service large immigrant communities already have come up with a variety of programs to meet their needs and their budgets from pooling interpreter services or using telephone language hot-lines, to training bilingual, non-medical staff in medical terminology.

RUKAVINA: "There is an emerging field of study on how to effectively and efficiently⁹ provide these interpreter services and there is more attention being paid in the medical community as well."

TEXT: Immigration activists¹⁰ say it is not just the medical community that needs to take action.

Last month, hundreds of immigrants in New York City marched to show their support for legislation that would require the city's health, welfare and employment agencies to use interpreters, too.

AA: VOA's Laurie Kassman reporting. And that's Wordmaster for this week.

RS: Our postal¹¹ address is VOA Wordmaster, Washington DC 20237 USA. Our e-mail is。。。。。。。。。。And you can find our programs on the Web at voanews.com/wordmaster. With Avi Arditti, I'm Rosanne Skirble.

 

1 linguistic   

adj.语言的，语言学的

参考例句：

• She is pursuing her linguistic researches.她在从事语言学的研究。
• The ability to write is a supreme test of linguistic competence.写作能力是对语言能力的最高形式的测试。

2 diagnosis   

n.诊断，诊断结果，调查分析，判断

参考例句：

• His symptoms gave no obvious pointer to a possible diagnosis.他的症状无法作出明确的诊断。
• The engineer made a complete diagnosis of the bridge's collapse.工程师对桥的倒塌做一次彻底的调查分析。

3 affiliated   

adj. 附属的, 有关连的

参考例句：

• The hospital is affiliated with the local university. 这家医院附属于当地大学。
• All affiliated members can vote. 所有隶属成员都有投票权。

4 interpretation   

n.解释，说明，描述；艺术处理

参考例句：

• His statement admits of one interpretation only.他的话只有一种解释。
• Analysis and interpretation is a very personal thing.分析与说明是个很主观的事情。

5 terminology   

n.术语；专有名词

参考例句：

• He particularly criticized the terminology in the document.他特别批评了文件中使用的术语。
• The article uses rather specialized musical terminology.这篇文章用了相当专业的音乐术语。

6 accurately   

adv.准确地，精确地

参考例句：

• It is hard to hit the ball accurately.准确地击中球很难。
• Now scientists can forecast the weather accurately.现在科学家们能准确地预报天气。

7 secondly   

adv.第二，其次

参考例句：

• Secondly,use your own head and present your point of view.第二，动脑筋提出自己的见解。
• Secondly it is necessary to define the applied load.其次，需要确定所作用的载荷。

8 reimbursement   

n.偿还，退还

参考例句：

• He received reimbursement for his travel expenses.由于出差的花费他可以得到公司的补偿。
• Which forms do I need to complete for my travel reimbursement?我需要填什么表来报我的旅费？

9 efficiently   

adv.高效率地，有能力地

参考例句：

• The worker oils the machine to operate it more efficiently.工人给机器上油以使机器运转更有效。
• Local authorities have to learn to allocate resources efficiently.地方政府必须学会有效地分配资源。

10 activists   

n.（政治活动的）积极分子，活动家( activist的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• His research work was attacked by animal rights activists . 他的研究受到了动物权益维护者的抨击。
• Party activists with lower middle class pedigrees are numerous. 党的激进分子中有很多出身于中产阶级下层。 来自《简明英汉词典》

11 postal   

adj.邮政的，邮局的

参考例句：

• A postal network now covers the whole country.邮路遍及全国。
• Remember to use postal code.勿忘使用邮政编码。