OAKLAND, Calif. – When Khanh Trong Vu, 85, went to Summit Medical Center here with sharp abdominal pains three years ago, doctors and nurses there couldn’t understand what he was trying to tell them in his native Vietnamese. So in desperation he called a Vietnamese friend, Phuong Hang Phi Duong, to interpret for him.

A series of blood tests later, he was quickly wheeled into surgery to remove an inflamed appendix.

“I was luckily at home when he called,” noted Duong, whose timely arrival at the hospital Vu believed saved his life.

Though medical interpreters play a vital role in providing medical care, there’s a shortage in these professionals, in part because the state currently does not reimburse language interpreters.

With health care coverage expanded to an additional 2 million Californians through the Affordable Care Act, community clinics are seeing a need for interpreters like never before.

“There are a number of newly eligible with huge language needs,” asserted Cary Sanders, director of policy analysis with the California Pan-Ethnic Health Network.

A new state bill seeks to boost the number of medical interpreters in the state.

Vu, as well as one other patient, Ti Wu, a native of Myanmar, shared his experience at a June 20 discussion hosted by Assemblymember Rob Bonta, the Democrat who represents the state’s 18th district, on the critical need for interpreters. California has the nation’s largest immigrant community, and 40 percent of its residents speak a language other than English at home.

For people like them, Bonta said, as he stumped for former Speaker John Perez’s bill, AB 2325, which would create a system – called CommuniCal — to improve Medi-Cal beneficiaries’ access to interpreters at physician offices and hospitals in the state, interpreters could make the difference between life and death. Medi-Cal is California’s health care program for its low-income population, known as Medicaid in the rest of the nation. More.

See: New America Media

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