LOST IN TRANSLATION
Recently my volunteer work at the State Prison Hospital has been primarily as a Spanish English translator for prisoner/patients either confined in the hospital wards or as outpatient needing medical care. These patients are either Central or South American Spanish speaking patients. Many of the ones I meet have been in the US for more than 15 or 20 years, yet they either do not fully understand or cannot communicate in English. Obviously this handicap greatly contributes to the deterioration in their medical ailments. Here are a few of my past encounters.
Case Patient One was in the waiting room getting ready for an operation in the Surgical Unit. The medical staff needed to fill out a significant number of checkups and paper work which needed to be completed before the surgeon could proceed with the operation. Not only was the patient required to give them information but also to receive medical treatments. To complicate matters, the patient’s degree of anxiety usually magnified during this waiting and answering of questions period. My work not only consisted of interpreting these questions but also to try to calm these patients down. I remember Patient One asking me to stay longer in the surgical area even during and after the operation. As I suspected the reason for his anxiety was he thought the operation was an excuse for the prison medical personnel to execute him in the operating room.
Case Patient Two was an outpatient regular visitor who had a history of heart problems. The medical care given to him at the Prison Hospital was more than any outside citizen would normally get. In my thoughts, I wondered whether the poor average citizen outside prison would be able to afford such treatments. These included not only doctor regular checkups but also extraordinary medical remedies such as installing a pace maker on the patient, etc. At one visit the doctor recommended a bypass operation. The patient informed me to tell the medical staff he was not willing to undergo such an operation as he was already in his 60’s. Besides he informed me his father died of the same heart ailments in his 40’s. However, there was one medical problem the prison personnel either would or could not handle. The prisoner was mentally ill. His conversation with me gave him away. How would the prison medical staff handle this mental illness if there were no available Spanish-English speaking counselor or psychologist?
Case Patient Three was an Eye clinic patient who had eye sight problems. After examination by a medical student then followed by the supervising eye doctor in charge, the patient was told his sight problems seem to be getting progressively worse. The problem was this patient had never had an eye examination most probably even before he was incarcerated and there developed growing scars in his eyes all those years. The treatment was now only confined to controlling these scars tissues from growing worse. It was too late to have an eye operation. And so control medical remedies were given. The medical staff as I explained to the patient emphasized how to follow these medical instructions and medicine given to him was to be followed. We emphasized the fact that if this patient would not follow these remedies that he would eventually end up going blind.
Case Patient Four was an HIV patient deteriorating to a possible AIDS status. We had difficulty retracing his case history as he occasionally lied during a questioning period. Eventually, when we were alone he mentioned with some pride how when he was a former bus driver in his native country that he had a woman in every bus destination. Being on an outpatient status he would then be transported back to his cell block. He later complained about problems urinating. He also stated that his cell did not have a toilet bowl. And so during curfew time at nights, he contrived several container schemes where he could discharge his urine in his cell room. He had no way to explain to the correction officers of his need to go to the toilet more often. On a later clinical visit the doctor informed him he had prostate cancer. Because he was seriously ill an operation was scheduled to be performed at the better equipped city hospital. Again there needed to be a translator all this time right up to preparation and recovery from the operation. His HIV status weakened his immune system so that his cancer eventually metastasized. A few days before he died at the prison hospital room he motioned to me to read to him a letter in the drawer from his brother out West. He was not very conversant and almost comatose. I was later surprised to be informed the brother who wrote this emotional letter was a Ph D Engineering candidate at some state university. What a contrast between the two brothers! We finally contacted a catholic priest to give him the catholic Last Rites.
Case Patient Five was either a hilarious or sad case depending on how you look at it. This patient was in the recovery room within the surgical unit area at the prison hospital. He had a minor operation. A young nurse was attending to him in this recovery room. He seemed bored. And so he said in Spanish that he would pass the time masturbating.
There is a TV program showing cases of Americans being incarcerated in foreign countries and their subsequent pleas for release. This is the reverse case but probably a worse situation. The fact is that these Latin prisoners are mostly uneducated. These prisoners are not fully conscious of what is happening to them while in prison. They are like logs floating in an ocean waiting to be washed on a shore, ending up to be released or dying in prison.
Recently my volunteer work at the State Prison Hospital has been primarily as a Spanish English translator for prisoner/patients either confined in the hospital wards or as outpatient needing medical care. These patients are either Central or South American Spanish speaking patients. Many of the ones I meet have been in the US for more than 15 or 20 years, yet they either do not fully understand or cannot communicate in English. Obviously this handicap greatly contributes to the deterioration in their medical ailments. Here are a few of my past encounters.
Case Patient One was in the waiting room getting ready for an operation in the Surgical Unit. The medical staff needed to fill out a significant number of checkups and paper work which needed to be completed before the surgeon could proceed with the operation. Not only was the patient required to give them information but also to receive medical treatments. To complicate matters, the patient’s degree of anxiety usually magnified during this waiting and answering of questions period. My work not only consisted of interpreting these questions but also to try to calm these patients down. I remember Patient One asking me to stay longer in the surgical area even during and after the operation. As I suspected the reason for his anxiety was he thought the operation was an excuse for the prison medical personnel to execute him in the operating room.
Case Patient Two was an outpatient regular visitor who had a history of heart problems. The medical care given to him at the Prison Hospital was more than any outside citizen would normally get. In my thoughts, I wondered whether the poor average citizen outside prison would be able to afford such treatments. These included not only doctor regular checkups but also extraordinary medical remedies such as installing a pace maker on the patient, etc. At one visit the doctor recommended a bypass operation. The patient informed me to tell the medical staff he was not willing to undergo such an operation as he was already in his 60’s. Besides he informed me his father died of the same heart ailments in his 40’s. However, there was one medical problem the prison personnel either would or could not handle. The prisoner was mentally ill. His conversation with me gave him away. How would the prison medical staff handle this mental illness if there were no available Spanish-English speaking counselor or psychologist?
Case Patient Three was an Eye clinic patient who had eye sight problems. After examination by a medical student then followed by the supervising eye doctor in charge, the patient was told his sight problems seem to be getting progressively worse. The problem was this patient had never had an eye examination most probably even before he was incarcerated and there developed growing scars in his eyes all those years. The treatment was now only confined to controlling these scars tissues from growing worse. It was too late to have an eye operation. And so control medical remedies were given. The medical staff as I explained to the patient emphasized how to follow these medical instructions and medicine given to him was to be followed. We emphasized the fact that if this patient would not follow these remedies that he would eventually end up going blind.
Case Patient Four was an HIV patient deteriorating to a possible AIDS status. We had difficulty retracing his case history as he occasionally lied during a questioning period. Eventually, when we were alone he mentioned with some pride how when he was a former bus driver in his native country that he had a woman in every bus destination. Being on an outpatient status he would then be transported back to his cell block. He later complained about problems urinating. He also stated that his cell did not have a toilet bowl. And so during curfew time at nights, he contrived several container schemes where he could discharge his urine in his cell room. He had no way to explain to the correction officers of his need to go to the toilet more often. On a later clinical visit the doctor informed him he had prostate cancer. Because he was seriously ill an operation was scheduled to be performed at the better equipped city hospital. Again there needed to be a translator all this time right up to preparation and recovery from the operation. His HIV status weakened his immune system so that his cancer eventually metastasized. A few days before he died at the prison hospital room he motioned to me to read to him a letter in the drawer from his brother out West. He was not very conversant and almost comatose. I was later surprised to be informed the brother who wrote this emotional letter was a Ph D Engineering candidate at some state university. What a contrast between the two brothers! We finally contacted a catholic priest to give him the catholic Last Rites.
Case Patient Five was either a hilarious or sad case depending on how you look at it. This patient was in the recovery room within the surgical unit area at the prison hospital. He had a minor operation. A young nurse was attending to him in this recovery room. He seemed bored. And so he said in Spanish that he would pass the time masturbating.
There is a TV program showing cases of Americans being incarcerated in foreign countries and their subsequent pleas for release. This is the reverse case but probably a worse situation. The fact is that these Latin prisoners are mostly uneducated. These prisoners are not fully conscious of what is happening to them while in prison. They are like logs floating in an ocean waiting to be washed on a shore, ending up to be released or dying in prison.
posted by Antonio at 10:50 AM
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