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APHA Scientific Session and Event Listing

Recorded presentation

Sheryl D. Taylor, MPH, Office of Multicultural Health and Center for Emergency Preparedness, Symphony Tailored Health Solutions And MA Department of Public Health, 1514 Silver Street, Jacksonville, FL 32206, 904.861.7791, Sheryl_Taylor_Thompson@yahoo.com, Brunilda Torres, MSW, Massachusetts Department of Public Health, 250 Washington Street, Boston, MA 02108, and Jeffrey Timperi, MPA, Center for Emergency Preparedness, Massachusetts Department of Public Health, 250 Washington Street, Boston, MA 02108.

Assuring quality, accessible, and appropriate communication for special populations is a vital component of planning for emergencies across the commonwealth. Language interpretation and translation for persons who have no or limited English proficiency (LEP) is not only critical to providing care in daily issues but vital in emergency situations. As is common in emergency planning, identifying and recruiting sufficient numbers of appropriately skilled individuals is a major challenge. Determining which languages, what type of language services are needed, and locating appropriate staffing can be a difficult process. Building on its success in providing statewide access to interpreters in the emergency room, The Office of Multicultural Health and the Center for Emergency Preparedness at the Massachusetts Department of Public Health (MDPH) developed a tool for Local Boards of Health (LBoH) to plan and work in tandem with hospitals, community health centers, and local community based resources to address the needs for language services in emergency situations. MDPH outlined a process for LBoHs to identify, engage, and partner with non-English speaking, LEP groups, and organizations serving those groups in their local communities to create and ensure language services during times of disaster or crisis. As part of this effort, MDPH developed a separate tool to help LEP individuals and families better prepare themselves to communicate with emergency workers in the absence of appropriate language access services.

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