Well, hello there. I'm Nurse Mo, and this is Mo's Monday Minute, a shorty episode of the straight A Nursing podcast where I share a quick tip you can start using to improve your practice or your

habits right away. For more in-depth topics, check out the episodes that I release on Thursdays.

So today I'm talking with you very quickly about how to approach your shift when your patient is

non-English speaking or not a native speaker to whatever language you are

using in your practice.

Maybe you are a nurse listening from some other part of the world and you mostly use Spanish,

but then you have a patient come in who only speaks Japanese.

You know what I mean.

How are you going to approach your patient when they do not speak the same language that you do?

So I'm speaking to this from a standpoint of someone who works in America, the United States. So I will be talking about English

language, but again, this can apply across the board. So lots of times. And this is where it kind of

gets a little bit sticky. Like I find that it's almost easier if the patient speaks zero English versus if they

speak a little bit of English. And the reason for this is that when your patient speaks a little

bit of your language, that can lull you into a false sense of thinking, they're understanding

enough. They're figuring out what I'm saying. We're getting by,

especially because a lot of the time you might be asking very simple questions that, yes, they do

understand like, are you in pain? Do you need to use the bathroom? A lot of patients can

understand those things even if their English is very, very limited.

But what if you really need to know some valuable information? And here's another tip.

If you're asking your patient simple questions like, are you in pain or do you need to use

the restroom? And they're always saying no. How do you know that they're really understanding

what you're saying?

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