All written materials at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta are in English and Spanish.  That is because Hispanic families are about 10% of the patient population, says Kathy Ordelt, RN, patient and family education coordinator. Most of the 400 patient education titles were translated in-house because outside companies don’t do a good job translating clinical information, she says.

Instead of outsourcing materials, a couple of the interpreters at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta translate them.  However, because interpretation is their primary job, Ordelt sometimes waits three or four weeks before a pamphlet is translated.

The health care facility has very little written materials for patients who speak languages other than Spanish and English.  “Sometimes, the library has something they can give families; but for the most part, we rely on oral teaching and oral communication,” says Ordelt.

The main source for teaching sheets at Deborah Heart and Lung Center in Browns Mills, NJ, is a database provided by Micromedex that provides information in English and Spanish.  “If we needed translation in another language, we have physicians and other professional staff from all over the world who are able to translate materials for us,” says Laura Gebers, BSN, RN, BC, Patient Care Services program health education coordinator.

When she was hired there were educational materials in Greek, Russian, Spanish, and Polish, but she didn’t have a way to validate that the information was current and accurate, so she discarded the materials.

Having the ability to have it back-translated to make sure they are accurate is important, says Diane Moyer, RN, MS, program manager for consumer health education at the

Moyer has partnered with two other health care facilities … They will share the material within their systems and make them available on-line.

The Ohio State University Medical Center in Columbus.  “ Unless we have the ability to have it back-translated, I don’t know if we are giving out appropriate material or not, so that becomes a concern.  This is something we have been addressing with our interpreters,“ says Moyer.

The Ohio State University Medical Center has material in Spanish and Somali.  Although Russian patients are seen, there has not been enough volume to warrant the cost of translation.  The criterion for translation is that the handout is needed for patients at least five times a month.

“The cost of translation is going up and the needs are increasing, and we can’t meet it.  We are basically holding our own, trying to keep those things that we had translated in the past updated,” says Moyer.

To remedy the problem, Moyer has partnered with two other health care facilities to write a grant for the translation of patient education materials. They will share the material within their systems and make them available online.

When the inventories of all three locations were reviewed, the partners discovered that the materials they already had translated were almost identical.  Pooling their resources gives them a better product because they can share the expertise of three coordinators, says Moyer.

At the cost of translation, it is important that the material be culturally appropriate.  To date, translated materials are simply the English version written in another language and Moyer wonders if they are culturally appropriate.  To redo the illustrations and change the copy to incorporate the target population’s cultural beliefs is more expensive; however, the material would be more beneficial, says Moyer.