Que idiomas?

Ahh, a bit of a break after three in a row. I really like working my days back to back. It really keeps me in the mindset, but then I have to shift back to relax mode once I get home, or I drive John crazy!

Interesting story from day two. I've had a couple of encounters with Spanish speaking patients, a few traumas, a couple at the free clinic I volunteered at, one or two since I've moved. Every time my minimal amount of Spanish has sufficed until I can get an interpreter or call on the "language line." Yesterday, a patient came in that spoke ONLY Spanish, understood no English (most of the time there's a bit of leeway) add to this that she was seen in fast track where there are no phone jacks, and there were no physicians that spoke Spanish either. I did as much as I could and relied heavily on Rosa one of our registrars, but it really hit me how much better I could do. How much better we all could do if we could communicate just a little bit better. I could understand that her stomach hurt, and had been for four days, she had a headache, hot flashes and needed some medicine. I had Rosa come in to get a bit more history on her because all her triage note said was "Unable to triage." Crap.
We found out she had been seen at the free clinic and was here to have some blood work done and get a prescription for her____. Rosa didn't know that word. Crap again. She looked at me and said, "Listen, is that the word for arthritis? She's saying her body is aching and she feels hot because of her ____. She needs medicine for her _____. She's had it for 10 years."
So we had her say it again, and again, and again. No success. I could barely even make it out. Then she said she had a lump in her throat (I knew those words)
"Thyroid?" I said pointing at my neck.
"Tiroides."
"Es medicina levothyroxine?"
"Levothyroxine 100 meeleegrams."

Wahoo!! I figured it out!
I told her I needed to draw her blood and would be right back. Boy, was I proud of myself I was able to explain that to the physician. Phew. It was a fun day. I learned there's a lot I could learn to help out. I've never felt better than when I did discharging her. I printed out her instructions in Spanish, but her follow up information wouldn't automatically translate, so I had to do that as well. I had to get her a map to another clinic, Rosa explained which ones she had to take her ID to so she could be seen and we made sure she understood they could get her lab results over the computer and she should go sometime next week. It felt good.
So I spent this morning translating our triage assessment into Spanish. Really simple yes and no questions because there are no phone jacks at triage, we can't get the language line until they're in a room.

The mind is really funny. Once I started trying to speak Spanish again I kept mixing in German and I found myself signing to her as well. I was accessing all of my secondary languages at once. It was incredibly difficult to focus on the one language and say the correct words. This was probably the most difficult part was trying to pick out which word from which language was the correct one for the situation.

Now.
Necesito una muestra de orina.

; )