Healthcare Archives - All Graduates

All Graduates | 8 Jul 2020

Responding to the needs of the community, we have produced translated Telehealth
instruction sheets for patients of CALD backgrounds for the Video Call platform.

The following languages are provided:

Arabic, Burmese, Greek, Indonesian, Italian,
Karen, Macedonian, Persian, Simplified Chinese, Spanish,
Swahili, Traditional Chinese, Turkish, Vietnamese

View the translations here

Client Testimonials:

“All Graduates Interpreters and Translators assists Alfred Health Language Services department with the provision of Telehealth video-conference interpreting service in inpatient and outpatient settings. The set-up of the service was stress-free and managed in a timely fashion. The professionalism, reliability and, flexibility of Ismail and Mikaela helps Language Services to provide quality VRI to Alfred Health LEP patients.”

Ida Giaccio, Team Leader, Alfred Health Language Services

“Melbourne Health has a long standing relationship with All Graduates Interpreting and Translating Services. All Graduates take particular care with our portfolio, and we feel our health service is a top priority. All Graduates takes innovative steps to ensure that we are provided with the best outcomes for our health service. One of our biggest achievements is the successful partnership with the Health Direct Telehealth platform which enabled Melbourne Health to provide video interpreters via a secure platform to our patients and staff. As this service was established long before the COVID-19 pandemic hit, there were no delays in providing this service to our staff and patients.”

Christina Leontiou, Interpreter Coordinator, The Royal Melbourne Hospital

“The skilled and highly experienced All Graduates telehealth staff have been instrumental in the success of the virtual remote interpreting service for CaLD patients by liaising with the in-house IT/telehealth team, advising on the workflow coordination of the remote interpreters and assisting with problem solving.”

A major metropolitan health provider

Language is the link between behaviour and outcome

Ellias Appel | 25 Jun 2019

Strategic Justification

A few months ago, the Daniel Andrew led Victorian Labor Government committed to find “$1.8 billion in savings, which amounts to 4 per cent of its [public service] resources [spending]“. This is an interesting amount, because 4% seems like such a pithy number… and then you realise that we’re talking in the billions and you need to adjust the scale of your perspective.

One of the fascinating elements in finding these savings is that there is often a metric of change which blows that 4% out of the water. For example, we recently tendered for a project aimed at changing patient behaviour for after-hours medical treatments. In a study performed by Deloitte in 2016, they identified that:

“The lowest cost pathways for patients seeking after hours primary care are extended and ‘after hours only’ clinics ($93) … Emergency departments [are] the most expensive [pathway] at $1,351 if arriving by ambulance (or treated and not transported) and $368 if self-presenting.”

To put this in perspective, the inappropriate use of Emergency Departments (i.e. non-critical presentations) significantly impacts the capacity of the healthcare system, as well as incurring costs of 4-14 times their primary health care equivalent. These behaviours are often a consequence of a complex series of factors, but in the case of Culturally and Linguistically Diverse patient groups, there is often an underlying health literacy deficit, specifically regarding awareness of health services.

Census data suggest a strong likelihood of underlying poor literacy and poor English language abilities in the CALD community, and this may additionally be stymieing the effectiveness of traditional campaigns and resources to effect change in the consumer decision making process for these groups. Consequently, creating engaging content and positively impacting on the customer experience is not as simple as translating written materials.

As shown in a research study we recently posted, audio can be the ‘missing link’ in effective engagement for groups with poor English language ability. Additionally, because of varying cultural trends in navigating power-dynamics, it is also important to ensure that your content is assessed for cultural appropriateness and translated by an appropriately qualified professional.

We encourage organisations that are seeking to engage with CALD groups, whether on a large scale (geographically or in population terms) or in highly targeted niche interactions, to explore data rich engagement options, such as online audio delivery, trackable links, IP geolocation and other related options.

Customer engagement is crucial to improving health literacy outcomes, but the same is true for other preferred behavioural outcomes you are trying to instil in your audience. Language informs effective communication within both marketing and resource development, and this is ultimately the linkage between your messages, and the customer outcomes you are pursuing.