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MARTTI clears language barriers What happens when a patient and care provider don’t speak the same language? What if there’s a life-threatening emergency late at night, with no quick access to an interpreter?
more personal. “And we trust MARTTI, even during very technical medical discussions.”
t BryanLGH Medical Center and Crete Area Medical Center, we call for MARTTI. Short for My Accessible Real Time Trusted Interpreter, this video remote interpreting system is long on communication skills. The service from the Language Access Network provides immediate interpreting in 170 languages, including American Sign Language. There are nine MARTTIs in use, with two of the BryanLGH devices and a third at Crete Area Medical Center courtesy of the BryanLGH Foundation. Each has a video monitor with built-in camera and microphone — and wheels allow the battery-powered MARTTI to go anywhere.
MARTTI to the rescue
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Benefits arrive quickly “MARTTI is helping us meet patients’ emergent needs for interpretive services, such as someone who has limited English skills or who’s deaf or hard of hearing,” says critical care services director Karen Dike, MSN, RN. “Before MARTTI, if a deaf patient came to the Emergency Department at 2 a.m., we might be faced with a crisis because it isn’t easy to find an interpreter at that hour.” Like many Nebraska hospitals serving multi-cultural populations, in such situations, BryanLGH care givers waited until an interpreter arrived in person — or relied on a family member to act as interpreter, which left the hospital staff unsure what message was conveyed. And in a tightknit society of non-English speakers, a local interpreter may be recognized, possibly making patients uncomfortable discussing complicated health issues. But MARTTI’s interpreters are in other communities, which resolves such potential privacy concerns. “That’s a big benefit,” Dike says. “We have ready access to interpreters who have training in medical terminology. MARTTI improves access to care and helps us meet new Joint Commission and Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services regulations. MARTTI has been warmly received by our nursing staff, physicians and patients.” Hospitalist Lance Schupbach, MD, wholeheartedly agrees. “Sometimes we can’t get a local interpreter here fast, but through MARTTI the wait usually is just a minute or two, so that’s handy,” he says. “Patients treat it naturally, almost as if the MARTTI interpreter is in the room; perhaps because it’s a live image and conversation, it seems
Communicating with patients in a way they feel comfortable is necessary for providing the best possible clinical care, says clinical nurse specialist Mary Ellen Hook, APRN-CNS. She notes about 1,000 BryanLGH co-workers and physicians have been taught the language of MARTTI. They ask the MARTTI call center in Cleveland, Ohio, for an interpreter for a specific language. A nurse or other care giver in the medical center stands next to MARTTI’s screen during the conversation, and the picture-in-picture view allows the patient to see the interpreter and nurse at the same time. “MARTTI really fills our needs,” Hook points out. “This might be for a brief question, or the conversation could last for several minutes when a physician is assessing a patient or a nurse is doing discharge teaching and care planning.” Translation: MARTTI is a big help for everyone providing care and treatment.
Real-world success stories In this part of Nebraska, not only do we hear some of the more common languages, such as Spanish and Vietnamese, but our patients may communicate principally in Portuguese or in an African dialect. Dr. Schupbach says, “I’ve taken care of several patients who know little or no English — and I only speak a little Spanish. “In the case of a pregnant Mandarin Chinese woman, we discussed the ramifications of her blot clot. The interpreting episode went so well that at the end, we had bonded and were sharing stories through MARTTI about each other’s families,” he recalls. “Two other recent cases involved a couple of patients who spoke only Ukranian and Arabic; the interpreters handled those challenges really well. “Those could have posed problems due to communication issues, but because of MARTTI, the interactions went pretty smoothly.” n To see a video about MARTTI, go to www. bryanlgh.org or use your smartphone’s QR application to access this code. To find out how you can support such programs through the BryanLGH Foundation, call 402-481-8605.
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