Healthcare professionals' experiences of the usefulness and ease of using a digital medical translation tool in communicating with minority language-speaking hospitalized heart surgery patients

Abstract Background/Introduction Healthcare professionals are required to deliver high-quality care while adhering to the human right to equity for all patients. Language barriers often result in miscommunication between healthcare professionals and patients, leading to decreased patient satisfaction, compromised patient safety (such as increased adverse events), and diminished healthcare quality. Studies focusing on implementing digital medical translation tools and measuring their usefulness during patients’ hospitalization are highly warranted. Purpose To survey and explore healthcare professionals' experiences of the usefulness and ease of using a digital medical translation tool in communicating with minority language-speaking heart surgery patients during hospitalization. Methods Participants completed an internationally published six-item, study-specific questionnaire on health care professionals' experiences regarding perceived usefulness and ease of use from October 2022 to February 2023. The first three items, namely: (1) 'The digital tool was easy to use,' (2) 'The languages were easy to understand,' and (3) 'The digital tool was useful,' were measured on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from 1 ('totally agree') to 5 ('totally disagree'). The last three items were open-ended: (4) 'What they liked best,' (5) 'What they liked the least,' and (6) 'Suggestions for improvement'. Results Health care professionals (i.e., registered nurses, intensive care nurses, operating room nurses, anaesthesia nurses and physiotherapists) (n=53) aged, mean 35 (SD, min-max 9.7, 25-58). They reported the digital medical translation tool was easy to use ("totally agree/agree" 15/33, 91%), easy to understand ("totally agree/agree" 30/22, 97%), and useful ("totally agree/agree" 24/25, 92%) as illustrated in figure 1. Illustrative citations from the open responses: What health care professionals liked best: "Enabling communication with minority language-speaking patients feels safe in terms of patient safety" and "The opportunity to form a clinical picture of the patient at the beginning of the shift gives me confidence. The possibility to meet the patient's psychosocial needs and the opportunity to more easily clarify situations and pains and discomforts." They liked the least that it "Took some time to find my way around between questions at the beginning of using the tool" and suggestions for improvement were cited as "Split up the phrases in the tool in several categories (icons) e.g., intubation phase" and "Add more phrases specific for our heart surgery patients". Conclusions Healthcare professionals found a digital medical translation tool to be useful and easy to use in meeting the needs of patients and improving patient safety during communication with minority-speaking heart surgery patients.