To bar the language constraint in hospitals, The International Medical Interpreters Association (IMIA) recently announced the publication of a new guide on telephone interpreting.

 

Phone interpreting is one of the most innovative services in the world, which lets anybody communicate with a foreign language speaker through multi-lingual phone interpreters in a more simple and instant way.

 

"Telephone interpreting is used by countless hospitals and health care facilities throughout the world," explained Izabel Arocha, IMIA president. "Our goal is to help our members and the public at large to learn more about this important method of delivering language access to patients across the globe."

 

The phone-based interpreting service, which enables interpreters for hundreds of languages to be instantly accessible via telephone, was first introduced in Australia in the 1970s, but is now used in the United States, Belgium, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Spain, Israel and many other countries, Arocha said.

 

The guide was developed in association with Nataly Kelly, the author of the first book on telephone interpreting. "In the United States alone, the business of telephone interpreting generates hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue annually, while saving millions of dollars in travel costs," commented Kelly, an analyst with Common Sense Advisory, an independent market research firm.

 

"Patient advocates, health care professionals and policymakers can only stand to benefit from learning more about this critical component of providing health care services to diverse patient groups," added Kelly.