Legislative lip service talks multilingual medical care, for Medicare beneficiaries. But the best intentions of regulators still leaves lots of LEP (Limited English Proficient) patients in the lurch. According to The California Medicare Part D Language Access Coalition report “Please Hold”, subtitled “Medicare Plans Leave Limited English Proficient Beneficiaries Waiting for Access,” getting help when you don’t speak English is tough. They had a bunch of callers playing LEP Medicade recipients call and try to get some questions answered. Responses, detailed in earlier posts, are anecdotal, and sound very familiar to what we’ve seen.
These guys were pretty hard on the telephone interpreting services that most healthcare providers rely on to improve access for non-English speakers. But as is clear from the report and again my own experience, that LEP problems don’t magically [...]
