November 21, 2006 Meeting Notes
Present: Karen Bahr, Joan Anderson, Kevin Flores, Helen Fagan, Stephanie Broady, Lori Seibel, Carly Woythaler Runestad, Darcy Tromanhauser, Kit Boesch, Malcolm Miles, Diane Lowe, Susan Kash-Brown, Gloria Sarmiento, Cecilia Creighton, Jean Krecji
Helen opened the meeting by sharing information regarding her experiences at the 2006 Quality Health Care for Culturally Diverse Populations Conference. Helen attended as a presenter on the Minority Women's Health Needs Study. She had the opportunity to tour Haborview Medical Center and discover some best practices with regard to how language needs are met in the hospital setting. She met Martine Pierre-Louis who works at Harborview. She had the opportunity to see a one woman show in which one woman presented the healthcare needs of several different people as if they were testifying before congress.
We moved on to a discussion regarding the NCIHC paper “Guide to Initial Assessment of Interpreter Qualifications." We discussed briefly the difference between certification and licensure and why it can be a mistake to have licensure without certification. In order to continue the discussion we were reminded that we were to read this document in order to further guide the activities of the Standards & Assessment committee. It was decided that it is too premature for the committee to focus on assessment at this point; and that the committee should only continue to further its current undertaking of mass endorsement of the NCIHC Standards of Practice. It was agreed that we need mass endorsement of the Standards in order to be taken seriously when we are ready to approach the legislature.
A lively discussion regarding endorsement of the Standards ensued. Joan expressed concern that physicians through the NE Med Association might see endorsement as an obligation to pay for costly interpreters and that she anticipates resistance to achieving the endorsement. We encouraged her to indicate to the MDs that these are not requirements, just guidelines and endorsement means they agree it is best to use interpreters who abide by them. Joan will relay this message.
We also discussed Action Strategy #5 by looking at some Language Identification Cards. We talked about different possible uses and how they could be distributed in a manner that increases awareness and allows for some educational opportunities. Karen will continue to work on this.
Karen and Joan reported on their meeting with the Nebraska Medical Association and shared the news that Dave Buntaine will be bringing the issue of Medicaid reimbursement to the Medicaid Committee at the December meeting. At the meeting with NMA we had also discussed the possibility of first obtaining reimbursement for the most vulnerable patient populations, such as pregnant women and children.
Diane Lowe announced that she is trying to get the meeting that was in the works with HHSS pushed up in order for it happen before Dick Nelson’s retirement.
We discussed how obtaining more data and beginning to increase awareness are imperative to achieving the goals of the Policymaker Awareness committee. Joan has volunteered an intern to take our previous survey statewide and we will also work with the Nebraska Hospital Association to see if they can help us survey the hospitals
We also looked at what it would take for Lincoln hospitals to hire staff interpreters. We discussed costs, logistics, etc. Lori agreed to contact Lynn Wilson and Bob Lanik to see if the matter could be explored further.
OUR NEXT MEETING IS TUESDAY, JANUARY 16TH, FROM 12:00 – 1:30 AT SCC CEC