Learning the language of health

Dealing with a serious illness or injury is scary enough, but then there’s the fact that often you have to quickly learn complicated medical terminology.

Fostoria Community Hospital has been working to improve health literacy. This includes not just making sure that hospital literature can be easily read and understood, but also working on ways to make sure interpreters are available for patients for whom English is not their first language.

October is Health Literacy Month, a time to raise awareness. But health literacy is important all year round.

Fostoria Community Hospital recently received a grant that allowed it to purchase new translation equipment. The computer equipment allows for videoconferencing with an interpreter in either Spanish or American Sign Language. The interpreter, based in Texas, is with Medviks Telemedicine Language Assistance.