Mental Health Settings: Are Sign Language Interpreters at Risk?

Monday, January 27, 2014 SPORK! 0 Comments

Friendlyville is a mid-sized city (population 85,000) in a Midwestern state with a Deaf (ASL) population of about 200.  Janice is one of the few RID certified sign language interpreters in Friendlyville. She is the child of Deaf parents, and chose to become an interpreter after graduating from an ITP in Bigtown in a different state.  Janice works with a sign language interpreting agency in Friendlyville, and she tends to be called upon for the most challenging assignments.  She travels in a multi-county area, sometimes going as far away as Metrocenter (population 1.3 million), a distance of 120 miles from Friendlyville.

On July 14, Janice was contacted by the Emergency Department of the Friendlyville Community Hospital and asked to interpret for a deaf man.  Janice asked for specifics regarding the individual for who she would interpret, but the person who called Janice stated that this information was confidential, and she would need to sign a HIPAA Compliance form before they could release any PHI to her.  So Janice arranged for daycare services for her two preschool children and rushed to the hospital.