The meeting itself drove home the necessity of interpretation.

Outfitted with headsets receiving signals from several interpreters, residents speaking seven languages met in City Heights Friday to coordinate a campaign to improve access to interpreters at doctors’ offices and hospitals.

At the start, members of the Karen (Burmese),Somali, Somali Bantu, Eritrean and Ethiopian communities huddled within arm’s reach of their designated interpreters. By the end, the attendees’ allegiances weren’t to their languages, but to their missions.

Some would circulate petitions. Others would talk to the media or plan lobbying trips to Sacramento.

The alliance grew out of the news that state Assembly Speaker John A. Pérez has introduced a bill that would draw down federal dollars to pay for medical interpretation services. A similar bill failed last year.

AB 1263 doesn’t differ much from last year’s proposal. It would create a system called CommuniCal to certify and register medical interpreters and reimburse their services.

What’s changed is the context in which it’s been introduced.

The Affordable Care Act will extend Medi-Cal coverage to 1.4 million Californians in the coming years, including a substantial amount of non-native English speakers. That expansion will heighten the need for medical interpretation, which providers andpatients say is already not being met. More.

See: KPBS

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