Staff Reporter

Communication between medical students and patients takes centre stage this week as Weill Cornell Medical College in Qatar (WCMC-Q) has begun a seven-day training programme for medical interpreters. A total of 25 candidates, selected from over 150 who applied, are attending the 40-hour ‘Bridging the Gap’ programme that started on Sunday.

They are the first professional medical interpreters to be trained in Qatar.

The course is run by experts from the Seattle-based Cross Cultural Health Care Programme (CCHCP), an organisation that has trained approximately 10,000 interpreters in the US, Canada and Japan since 1995.

The immediate aim is to train the participants, who are all fluent in English and one of four other languages, to work as translators and interpreters between the medical students and patients who speak only Arabic, Hindi, Tamil or Urdu.

The move comes as part of an initiative to ease the way for WCMC-Q’s medical students during their third year clinical clerkships, which commence in the hospitals of Hamad Medical Corporation in July.

Once qualified, a number of the interpreters will be tasked to support the students as they work with patients from among the local population and the diverse expatriate community.

A professional medical interpreter provides an immediate, accurate translation as the doctor - or medical student - takes a patient history, gives commands or explains procedures during the physical examination, and discusses treatment options. The interpreter also communicates discharge and medication instructions as required.

"The idea of training professional medical interpreters and translators is to get a verbatim translation of the written language and interpretation of the spoken language," said assistant professor of medicine and associate dean of clinical curriculum Dr Nounou Taleghani.

She noted that family members and health care professionals are not generally suitable to fulfil this role.

"Relatives may sift information out, or lack the expertise to translate accurately, while health-care professionals tend to allow their medical knowledge to interfere with a verbatim translation, adding a gloss to what the patient is saying," Taleghani explained.

The long-term aim of the initiative is to create a pool of trained personnel who would be available to provide translation and interpretation services whenever needed, she added.