Culturally and linguistically diverse patients and their carers can now access the Health Outcomes and Patient Experience (HOPE) portals in nine languages other than English.
Co-designed with consumers, clinicians and service managers, the HOPE platform was developed by eHealth NSW in partnership with the Agency for Clinical Innovation (ACI) and the Ministry of Health (MOH). It enables patients and their carers to share feedback on their personal health outcomes and experiences of care. This allows the real-time collection and use of Patient Reported Measures (PRMs).
The HOPE patient and carer portals now support Greek, Italian, Korean, Macedonian, Serbian, Simplified Chinese, Spanish, Traditional Chinese and Vietnamese. Arabic translation of the patient and carer portals is planned for release later in 2023. All Patient Reported Outcome Measures (PROMs) surveys have also been translated to support culturally safe and inclusive care for patients.
Melissa Tinsley, Associate Director, Integrated Digital Enablement Accelerator at the ACI said these translations make it easier for culturally and linguistically diverse patients and their carers to share their health experiences in their preferred language.
“This helps give health professionals a deeper understanding of culturally diverse patients’ needs and impacts of treatment,” Melissa said.
The Osteoporosis Refracture Prevention (ORP) outpatient service at Westmead Hospital collected the first PRM survey in a language other than English. During a recent outpatient appointment, an ORP clinician supported Jelena*, a Serbian native-speaker to complete the PRM survey in Serbian.
Jelena started the survey in English, but as the ORP clinician recalls, Jelena was having difficulty, asking for the first question to be explained to her. “I attempted to paraphrase the question a couple of times before suggesting Jelena try to complete the survey in Serbian,” the OPR clinician said. Jelena found the survey in Serbian much easier to complete.
“It was helpful to offer Jelena the survey in a language she could understand and complete on her own. It would have taken more time had I needed to paraphrase questions. Our service has since completed several translated surveys with other patients,” the ORP clinician said.
Translations to the HOPE portals will drive improvements for culturally and linguistically diverse patients across NSW. The collection and use of translated PROM surveys provide health professionals with a deeper understanding of the unique health needs of NSW’s growing culturally diverse communities. This means health services can better meet patient needs and drive improvements in service delivery.
PRMs is delivering better patient outcomes and continues to improve social, emotional and overall wellbeing for patients in NSW. The PRMs team continually update the portals to improve patient experience. For example, the recent addition of QR code access has helped patients to quickly and securely sign in. One patient from Grafton said, “the survey was quick and easy and using the QR code was really helpful.”
The state-wide PRMs/HOPE platform rollout continues with 717 sites live and over 60,000 patient surveys completed. This includes 203 PROM surveys completed in languages other than English, as of 20 April 2023.
*Name changed
