For improving Hospital Language Support System
The United States is one of the most diverse countries in the world. The 2007 population census states the total population to be 301,621,159—native being 263,561,465. Foreign born population is 12.62%- 38,059,694 and naturalized U.S. citizen is around 42.52%-16,181,883 from the 12.62%- 38,059,694. Moreover, people who are not a U.S. citizen living in U.S. is calculated to be around 57.48%-21,877,811(U.S. Census Place). As United States increasingly became a multiethnic and multicultural society by the growing population of immigrants, Limited English-proficient (LEP) speakers has risen as well. As of 2005, the data provide the great number of immigrants admitted to United States: total equals to 1,122,373 with states California (232,023) and New York (136,828) ranking as the leading states of immigrant admission (U.S.Census Immigrants). Families in the United States also illustrate the increasing multilingual society. U.S. census of 2007 shows this in a data of language spoken at home. From population 279,012,712, English only spoken at home is 80.3% while language other than English is 19.7%. From the 19.7%, 8.7% speak English less than “very well” (U.S. Census Language).
Thus, this portion of U.S. population faces communication difficulties especially in hospitals. The hospitals attempted to enforce a language support system to improve the language services, but despite effort hospital language support system for LEP patients lacks in efficiency. Therefore, through nurse and other medical professional staff language education, professional medical interpreters, and a special program, this insufficiency ought to improve.
The multilingual and multiethnic hospitals in United States have made effort in improving the language support programs in hospitals. The census data prove that almost 900,000 New Jersey residents are limited English-proficient speakers. The census provide data that the most common languages...