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Language and Culture Resource Center
The Language and Culture Resource Center
provides an all-in-one resource to ensure high-quality
linguistic and culturally sensitive health care interactions between patients,
their families and their clinicians at Rancho Los Amigos National
Rehabilitation Center.
The Center is a unique language interpreter and translation
service. It was created to better meet the needs of
the medical center’s patients and their families,
who come from linguistically and ethnically varied backgrounds that
reflect the broad diversity of Southern California’s population.
Services
The Language and Culture Resource Center
works with Rancho staff, patients and their families to facilitate effective
communication among people from different cultural and language backgrounds.
The Center coordinates all requests for interpretation,
provides language and culture-based training for both bilingual staff and
caregivers, and oversees translation of patient education materials.
It also serves as a clearinghouse for cultural resources, lending
to patients periodicals and books in their native
languages, connecting both patients and caregivers with ethnic and cultural
resources in the community, and providing caregivers with cultural information
that will enhance the care of individual patients.
A key function of the Center is organizing and increasing
the efficiency of Rancho’s language resources. It maintains a centralized
database of all bilingual Rancho employees, community volunteers and private
interpreter agencies and offers interpreter skills training for
bilingual staff members.
Recognition
The Center has been recognized with many honors for its
innovative work. These include the 2001 Spirit
of Diversity Award, conferred by the Los Angeles County Department of
Health Services Office of Diversity programs, the
2002 California Association of Public Hospital and Health Systems for
Management Excellence, the 2004 Multi-Cultural Diversity Special Achievement
Award by the Los Angeles County Office of Affirmative Actions,
the 2004 Los Angeles County Productivity and Quality Award, and
the 2006 Language Access Technology Leadership Award by the California
Association of Public Hospitals and Health Systems and Safety Net Institute.
In addition, a number of newspaper and magazine
articles have featured the Language and Culture Resource Center’s
groundbreaking work.
Grants Awarded
Rancho received a grant from the Los Angeles County Productivity Investment
Fund as a start-up cost to establish the Language and Culture Resource Center
in 2001, and to implement wireless technology system to enhance interpreter
accessibility.
In 2005, Rancho's Language and Culture Resource Center received a grant
from "Leading Organization Change", a program funded by the California
Endowment and a partnership between the California Association of Public
Hospitals and University of California, San Francisco. The funding is used
for implementing the Video Medical Interpreter (VMI) Program, which allows
patients and healthcare providers in remote parts of the hospital to view
their trained interpreter. Rancho is the first hospital in Southern
California and first among the Rehab hospitals in the world to implement
VMI.
Click here to view the Project Poster Board Summary.
In 2006, Rancho received grants from the California Health Care Safety
Net Institute to serve as a "Reviewer Hospital and "Implementer Hospital"
for language access policies and procedures and best practices, as a effort
to position California public hospitals as national leaders in the provision
of culturally appropriate services for Limited English Proficient patients.
Using advanced technologies to increase patients' and health care providers'
access to interpreting service, the Language and Culture Resource Center
continues to expand and improve Rancho's ability to provide culturally
sensitive and effective clinical care.
For more information:
Lily Wong, M.A., M.B.A.
Director, Language and Culture Resource Center
E-Mail: LCR@rancho.org
Telephone: (562) 401-7427 / Fax: (562) 401-6347 / TTY: (562)
401-8450 or (562) 401-6359
Page last updated February 17, 2011
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