Medical Chinese and cultural responsiveness initiative: Improving patient care in the Chinese community by reducing language and cultural barriers

A growing Chinese population demands that the healthcare community respond by reducing language and cultural barriers to optimal healthcare. A student initiative in 2006 led to an improved Medical Chinese Class at New York University School of Medicine and the development of the Medical Chinese Online Teaching Module containing interactive language media and cultural responsiveness information. Both resources aim to assist healthcare professionals of all language capabilities with building rapport and communicating with Chinese patients. We will investigate the effectiveness of these resources through pre- and post- self-report questionnaires and language assessments over one school year, when students will have access to both module and class. Self-report questionnaire measure confidence levels of communicating with Chinese-only speaking patients. Language assessments measure comprehension of medical Chinese terminology and basic interview phrases. Preliminary results show that students generally are confident in building rapport with Chinese-only speaking patients but feel less confident in taking a patient history and completing a physical exam. Students also report more fluency in conversational than medical Chinese. Most importantly, all students indicate a high level of motivation to learn medical Chinese. We anticipate improvement in self-report confidence scores and language assessment scores in students who utilize our resources, demonstrating improved Chinese language comprehension and reduced cultural and communication barriers. Addressing the lack of medical Chinese fluency and want of resources is a public health demand, which in combination with high student motivation, necessitates use and development of medical Chinese resources in all healthcare settings.