Interpreters

The question of interpreters for patients came up at the ADHB meeting yesterday. There is government funding for interpreters in hospitals and now it looks like the system will be extended to all GP practices as well. Wayne Brown, the outgoing chairman of the ADHB made a very important comment that the costs of this could blow out very easily. He suggested that it should be limited to telly or video calls using free software and the contracts should be let offshore if cost effective contracts cannot be negotiated here.

I would have to say I agree 100% with this. An alternaitve would be to try to argue to central government that this would be best handled through charities who support patients.

There was a very good presentation from staff at the school of population health on immigrant health issues. There are over 200 ethnicities now represented in the ADHB region. If we insisted on employing an interpreter for each language I can see a situation developing rapidly where, if no one could fill the vacancy for a small ethnic group we would have to recruit someone from overseas and get them to immigate here!

I would be interested in others thoughts and I will follow this situation closely if elected (and probably if I’m not!)