Effective communication with linguistically diverse patients: A concept analysis

Effective communication is essential to providing high-quality healthcare. For linguistically diverse patients, communication remains a barrier to receiving equitable healthcare throughout the globe. It is necessary to examine the concept of effective communication with linguistically diverse patients.

The Walker and Avant method was used to analyze the concept.

We define effective communication with linguistically diverse patients as any verbal or written communication between two or more individuals who do not speak the same language that utilizes accurate translation techniques to reach a shared message or understanding, where all parties involved are listened to and actively engaged. The antecedents, attributes, consequences, and empirical referents are mapped.

Effective communication with linguistically diverse patients is limited by a lack of access to professional language assistance, structural racism/discrimination, and policy barriers.

Healthcare workers hold the power to provide language assistance to patients and should therefore receive training in cultural competency, cultural humility, and how to work with professional medical interpreters and language access programs. Institutions should invest in multimodal approaches to provide equitable healthcare to linguistically diverse patients.