A pilot study of language and culture mediation in medical interpreting at border crossing points in Moscow, Russia

Abstract

The paper analyzes provision of medical interpreting services at border crossing points in the Russian Federation. It is argued in the article that medical interpreting at border crossing points should be viewed as linguacultural mediation in the context close to emergency situations, which requires specific interpreter's competences. The article aims at indenting relevant competences of medical interpreters at border crossing points through conducting an experiment on quality of medical services provision to migrants and refugees in terms of effective interpreter assisted doctor–patient communication. The research methodology rests on cluster, factor and discriminant analysis and integrated two stages: desk and field stages. To conduct the survey part an open-ended questionnaire has been developed which included 7 items. The survey was anonymous and involved native speakers of Arabic, Pashto, Dari, Uzbek, Tajik languages. The conducted research made it possible to identify factors that negatively influenced ultimate assessment of medical services provision at border crossing points. These factors are two-fold: the fists category relates to organizational issues such as lack of specific medicines and doctors with narrow specialization, stressful atmosphere and lengthy border crossing procedure; second category includes linguistic factor such as interpreter's knowledge of communicants' cultural background, ability to act as mediator, goal oriented communicative skills. The research results reveal that medical interpreting at border crossing points should be regarded as intercultural mediation as takes place in unstandardized setting and involves a range of culturally and socially significant issues. As the research outcomes the preliminary list of medical interpreter's competences has been drawn.

Mediación intercultural en el ámbito sanitario: Contribuciones a la atención sanitaria.

“…Así mismo, la Oficina Federal de Salud Pública y la Comisión Federal de los Extranjeros en Suiza incluyeron la mediación intercultural entre sus medidas estratégicas en relación con la inmigración y especialmente en el ámbito sanitario. Diversos autores, como Lutskovskaia et al (2019), reiteran la necesidad urgente de implementar la mediación para mejorar la interacción entre comunidades de llegada y de acogida en las distintas esferas sociales, incluidos los entornos administrativos, legal, sanitario y educativo; así como muestran que los resultados del estudio piloto realizado sobre mediación lingüística y cultural en la interpretación médica en los puntos fronterizos de Moscú, Rusia, revelaron la importancia de establecer la mediación intercultural en un entorno no estandarizado, que implica una variedad de cuestiones culturales y sociales que influyen en la interpretación médica. Volviendo a las experiencias de nuestro país, en la CC.AA.…”

Code of Ethics and Qualification Tests

“…Scholars consider current state of affairs and further developments of the Code of Ethics standards and features (Lee, Yun, 2020), emphasize the status of ethics within the formation of translator and interpreter's competence (Oraki, Tajvidi, 2020, Moorkens, Rocchi, 2020 explore collaboration among various specialists who engage in interpreting practices within particular domains (Lutskovskaia et al, 2019;, distinguish the concept of translator ethics development within professional and non-professional Education and Education of Social Sciences 18-19 January, 2021 settings (Lambert, 2020;Monzó-Nebot, Wallace, 2020), specify the potential of ICT tools for representation of interpreters' ethics phenomenon in the course of their professional activities (Atabekova, 2017(Atabekova, ,2018.…”