Reducing Health Inequities One Word at a Time

When patients with limited English skills visit a doctor, they encounter challenges that other patients may not, including low health literacy and difficulty with language interpretation.

'It's not really a case of what language do you speak but rather do the healthcare providers that are providing care also speak that language,' said LeMaster, who co-led the project.

'No question that patients in this population are at risk of safety issues in health care. If they are admitted to a hospital, they are more likely to have an adverse event.'

It's why he teamed with Sonna. Beginning as a patient-physician dyad in the Patient and Clinician Engagement Program -part of a PCORI-funded project with the North American Primary Care Research Group-to learn about PCOR's relevance to primary care, they later completed three projects with support from PCORI's Pipeline to Proposal Awards.

While these condition-specific projects were beneficial, patients desired more. Specifically, they appeared to express an interest in projects that focused on capacity building and healthcare systems-facing outcomes.