Written discharge instructions contain critical information about the patient’s diagnosis, treatment plan, and follow-up. 3 The discharge process is a particularly important point in terms of patient–provider communication. Patients with limited English proficiency (LEP) have low rates of understanding of appointment type and medications 1, higher rates of medication errors 2, and unplanned return visits to an emergency department. GT for discharge instructions in the ED is inconsistent between languages and should not be relied on for patient instructions. Mean Likert scores (on a 5-point scale) were high for fluency (4.2), adequacy (4.4), meaning (4.3), and severity (4.3) but also varied. Spanish had the highest accuracy rate (94%), followed by Tagalog (90%), Korean (82.5%), Chinese (81.7%), Farsi (67.5%), and Armenian (55%). The overall meaning was retained for 82.5% (330/400) of the translations. Volunteers were 50% female and spoke Spanish (5), Armenian (2), Chinese (3), Tagalog (4), Korean (2), and Farsi (2). Twenty volunteers evaluated 400 google translated discharge statements. Translations were evaluated using a previously validated matrix for scoring machine translation, containing 5-point Likert scales for fluency, adequacy, meaning, and severity, in addition to a dichotomous assessment of retention of the overall meaning. MethodsĪ prospective assessment of the accuracy of GT for 20 commonly used ED discharge instruction phrases, as evaluated by a convenience sample of native speakers of seven commonly spoken languages (Spanish, Chinese, Vietnamese, Tagalog, Korean, Armenian, and Farsi). To perform a pragmatic assessment of GT for the written translation of commonly used ED discharge instructions in seven commonly spoken languages. A recent study of discharge instructions in Spanish and Chinese suggested that accuracy rates of Google Translate (GT) were high. Because many hospitals have no mechanism for written translation, ED providers resort to the use of automated translation software, such as Google Translate (GT) for patient instructions.
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