Mean in-person interpreter arrival time was 19 min but highly variable (range 0-100) in a surgical and procedural practice

Description #

Across the study period, the mean time from calling for an in-person interpreter until arrival at the patient's bedside in the pre-anesthesia or pre-procedural areas was 19 min, but the wait was highly variable: standard deviation 17.5 min, range 0 to 100 min, median 17 min, and mode 0 min (0-min waits reflected an interpreter arriving with the patient). In the subset of cases where the in-person interpreter was called specifically by the operating-room or procedural-area staff, the median wait was longer, at 23 min. Figures are reported in the Results text; the paper has no figure or table dedicated to the wait-time distribution.

"The mean time from calling for an in-person interpreter until their arrival at the bedside of the patient was 19 min. The standard deviation was 17.5 min with a range from 0 to 100 min. The median and mode were 17 min and 0 min, respectively." (Burkle, 2017, p. 3)

"We separately calculated a median wait time of 23 min in those cases where an in person interpreter was called by the operating room or procedural area staff." (Burkle, 2017, p. 3)

Methods Context #

What? #ⓘ

The observable: elapsed time from the initial request for an in-person professional interpreter to that interpreter's arrival at the pre-anesthesia or pre-procedural area.

"When an in person interpreter was used, the time from initial request to arrival of that interpreter to the pre-anesthesia or pre-procedural areas was documented." (Burkle, 2017, p. 2)

How? #ⓘ

A single-institution observational quality-assurance study in which language-service needs were logged prospectively from operating-room and procedural locations over a ~2.5-month period in 2016, analyzed with descriptive statistics. See A-0008ArtifactA-0008Initial AI draftMayo Clinic tri-modal professional language services (in-person, telephone, VRI)The language-services department of a private, not-for-profit, quaternary-care US institution (Mayo Clinic) provides interpretive assistance to LEP patients across its surgical and procedural areas, aiming to meet federa….

"Following Mayo Clinic Institutional Review Board approval, the needs for patient language services were recorded from our operating room and procedural locations over a two and a half month period (June 13, 2016 and September 30, 2016)." (Burkle, 2017, p. 2)

Who? #ⓘ

LEP patients presenting to the surgical and outpatient procedural areas of a private, not-for-profit, quaternary-care institution serving patients from all 50 states and internationally; 354 LEP patients visited over the period, 318 records analyzable after 36 missing.

"Over the study period, 354 LEP patients visited our surgical and outpatient procedural areas. Information for 36 patients was missing leaving 318 records available for analysis." (Burkle, 2017, p. 2)

Other Notes #

The abstract and Results give the same 19-min mean. Note a denominator inconsistency elsewhere in the paper: the Results/Table 1 report 354 LEP patients (318 analyzed), whereas the Discussion states "362 LEP patients visited our surgical and procedural areas" (Burkle, 2017, p. 3).

Caveats #

• Single quaternary referral center with unusually comprehensive language services limits generalizability All findings come from a single private, not-for-profit, quaternary/tertiary-care institution serving patients from all 50 states and internationally, with an unusually comprehensive, well-resourced language-services program (43 FTE in-person interpreters, three modalities). The authors explicitly caution that this patient population and service capacity may not represent most US hospitals, so the short wait times, zero cancellations, high service uptake, modality mix, and Arabic-dominant language distribution may not transfer to lower-resourced or differently-composed settings.