15-10-2024, 09:19 PM
The amount of misinterpretation of the instructions implemented in Waikato Hospital is a sad indictment on the comprehension levels of many people combined with poorly worded media coverage of the issue.
My sister is a senior (~50 years experience) nurse who works in a large public hospital in Auckland. She has on numerous occasions over the past few years raised the fears and frustrations she is experiencing during her working day of immigrant nurses who struggle with English medical terminology and persist in talking between themselves in their native tongues in clinical and bedside situations. The hospital department where she works has instructed nurses to speak in English during their work, with non-English conversations tolerated in social surroundings such as in the canteen.
The language used by health professionals is often highly technical and specialised in order for rapid and precise transferral of patient's afflictions and treatment regimes. There is no place for miscommunications and misinterpretation of vital signs, nature of injuries or disease symptoms and/or pharmaceutical regimes is not an option as this can easily result in life threatening situations.
Comments being bandied around accusing Waikato Hospital of racism and failure of patient care levels are totally out of line. Where communications with patients are compromised due to lack of English skills interpreters are employed to allow full evaluation of their health issues and this is ongoing and not due to change but the large numbers of immigrant nurses now present in our health system is making for difficulties for senior staff and even NZ trained junior nurses as communications are tested by the prevalence of E2L staff members in their workplace.
My sister is a senior (~50 years experience) nurse who works in a large public hospital in Auckland. She has on numerous occasions over the past few years raised the fears and frustrations she is experiencing during her working day of immigrant nurses who struggle with English medical terminology and persist in talking between themselves in their native tongues in clinical and bedside situations. The hospital department where she works has instructed nurses to speak in English during their work, with non-English conversations tolerated in social surroundings such as in the canteen.
The language used by health professionals is often highly technical and specialised in order for rapid and precise transferral of patient's afflictions and treatment regimes. There is no place for miscommunications and misinterpretation of vital signs, nature of injuries or disease symptoms and/or pharmaceutical regimes is not an option as this can easily result in life threatening situations.
Comments being bandied around accusing Waikato Hospital of racism and failure of patient care levels are totally out of line. Where communications with patients are compromised due to lack of English skills interpreters are employed to allow full evaluation of their health issues and this is ongoing and not due to change but the large numbers of immigrant nurses now present in our health system is making for difficulties for senior staff and even NZ trained junior nurses as communications are tested by the prevalence of E2L staff members in their workplace.