About the Project

As language serves as a large part of human communication, and in the healthcare field particularly (Engelbrecht et al., 2008). It serves as the primary medium through which healthcare professionals communicate with patients and deliver quality care. This can be seen with patient and healthcare provider communication interactions, whereby patients must be able to express their symptoms, concerns, and medical history, while healthcare professionals need to provide clear instructions, diagnoses, and treatment plans, ensuring information is conveyed accurately. A patient may be misdiagnosed and given inappropriate treatment if a healthcare provider depends solely on an interpreter without having the basic language and communication skills themselves. Hence, language barriers that influence patient and healthcare professional communication have been shown to decrease the quality of care (Bartlett et al., 2003).   Therefore, the development of isiZulu terminologies for paediatric speech-language therapy practice will ensure that language barriers do not impact service delivery by providing students with access to resources and skills.

Project Aims

This study aims to determine the needs, develop a glossary and audio-visual resource of isiZulu clinical terminology and pilot the implementation and its use in two Speech Language Therapy paediatric clinical modules.

It seeks to address the following:
1. What are the isiZulu clinical terminologies needs of final-year Speech Language Therapy students in pediatric clinical modules?
2. How do final year students experience the implementation and use of isiZulu clinical terminologies during their pediatric clinical training?

Study Site

This study is being conducted with students who are placed at government hospitals, special needs schools and community placements as part of their clinical training in paediatric clinical modules.

Deliverables

• A bilingual glossary of clinical terms in English and isiZulu
• A digital audio-visual resource of isiZulu clinical terms recorded by the first-language speaker [Case history taking, assessment and treatment session]
• A report on a pilot study on the use of terminologies by students and Discipline full and part-time clinical training staff.

Research Team