$10K Grant Will Expand Program Helping Patients Understand Medical Care In Their Native Language
By Lynne Adkins
WILLOW GROVE, Pa. (CBS) -- Patients at Abington Health's Schilling Campus in Willow Grove can now use video phones and computer monitors to connect to human interpreters in more than a hundred languages.
Meg McGoldrick, the hospital's Chief Operating Officer, says it's quicker than the old way, waiting for an interpreter to travel from campus to campus.
"We have employees and if our employee is here, and the employee speaks the language that's requested, the employee can respond. If the employee can't respond because he's with another patient, we can call in a service and an outside service takes time to get here, and it's very expensive."
The grant from Verizon will let the hospital buy additional monitors so even more patients can get the interpretive services they need, as quickly as possible.
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