Pre-Anesthesia Phone Message and Rate of Return Based on Primary Language of Patient

Abstract

We noted that the number of telephone calls required to contact Non-English speaking patients to conduct the Pre-Anesthesia testing interview prior to the day of surgery appeared to be greater than the amount of calls placed to English speaking patients. The ability of patients and health care providers to communicate with each other is one of the most basic and vitally important elements to be addressed during a patient's involvement in the health care system. Because we see a large population of Non-English speaking patients entering the health care system, there is the potential for a less than desirable outcome and satisfaction. Mutual understanding is an imperative function when one enters the health care system, to the extent that the Non-English speaking patient may find oneself at a disadvantage from the start. The purpose of this study was to determine the degree of difficulty in contacting the Non-English speaking patient population for the Pre-Anesthesia Testing interview in contrast to the English speaking population. The results showed that compared to English speaking patients, Non-English speaking patients require almost twice as many calls on average to produce contact. In addition, Non-English speaking patients were less likely to return telephone calls than were the English speaking patients. Furthermore, the percent of day of surgery interviews and delays were higher for Non-English speaking patients. The data also showed that with a majority of the Non-English speaking patients an interpreter was utilized. As a result of our study, processes were implemented to promote early identification and documentation of language barriers.