Comments on: Healthcare Update 04-30-2012

By: Kier Salmon

Kier Salmon — Sat, 26 May 2012 23:32:00 +0000

Thanks. I’ve posted very similar numbers before, but nobody’s listening and last month I finally walked away from interpreting.

It hurt to leave a job I love so much, but I was getting less than $1,000/month and I can’t live on it. Now I get $9.50/hour for 35 hours a week, which is pretty low for the hard work I do as an office assistant, but at least I’m working regular hours, and someday I’ll get a better paying job.

By: M. D.

M. D. — Sat, 26 May 2012 19:25:30 +0000

I am an interpreter who works both over the phone and in person. The rates for Arabic Interpreters is $20 to $24 an hour for onsite Arabic interpreters.
I am also a doctor in my country. Interpreters get very few hours of work per day, because there are many agencies and many interpreters. Out of that small amount per hour, we have to pay taxes, commuting and parking expenses. We are paid only for the times we are at the clinic. For example if it takes 35 minutes each way, then I have to drive more than an hour, at my own expense time wise, gas, auto expenses etc. Many times, over 60 percent of the assignments are one hour only. Clinics are very keen not to keep the interpreter in the waiting room like other patients. I know that the agencies, with whom we are contracting with, make much more money and the medical personnel think that we are overpaid! For your information, that type of interpretation cannot , I repeat CANNOT make you able to live off that sort of spotty income. It is only like 300 to 700 a month if the agency likes you and are available to go everywhere they request. As for me, I have learned that it is in my best interest to stay within 10 miles from where I live. For OTP ( over the phone interpretation) they refused to pay me any cent above $0.50 a minute and they pay per minute. I learned from one provider I was interpreting for, that she was paying the agency $ 1.50 per minute. She was urging the non English speaking patient to learn English ASAP so she won’t have to use the interpreters. Thus, we get less than 1/3 what they are charging the clinics/ providers. Needless to say, pay rates have not increased but rather decreased in the last few years in spite of the inflation and rising gas prices. We get no benefits whatsoever, no paid vacations, insurance etc. If you are not able to work one day due to illness or an urgent appointment, your pay would be zero dollars. I never heard about $4 a minute from any interpreter.

By: Kier Salmon

Kier Salmon — Fri, 04 May 2012 18:59:35 +0000

I will repeat. The INTERPRETER does not “make out like a bandit.” The interpretive agency DOES. But you go meet an interpreter in the flesh and blood and ask them how much of that money reaches their pocket and they will laugh their heads off. If they get 25 cents a minute of the $4 + $38, I’ll eat crow.
I know the law makes you upset, but you risk malpractice when a family member or guy off the street says “lung” and means “kidney” (and I’ve seen that happen!) and the interpreter is the low man on the totempole and does not get that money… it goes to all the middle men.

By: throckmorton

throckmorton — Fri, 04 May 2012 13:55:17 +0000

The big problem we have with the mandate to provide interpetation/translation is who is paying for the mandate. As it stands, a person can come into your office, hospital, clinic and by law you have to provide an interpeter or translator at your expense. At our center we have the blue phones which the patient picks up one receiver and the medical person the other. It is $34 dollars to initiate the call and 8 dollars a minute after that regardless. This cost must be eaten by the facility, doctor, clinic etc.

So everyone else is getting stuck taking care of the person at their own expense while the interpeter/translator is making out like a bandit.

By: Kier Salmon

Kier Salmon — Thu, 03 May 2012 04:24:36 +0000

By the way, a translator translates the written word, and an interpreter interprets the spoken word.
Yes, I see how upset and angry you are at the situation. It pays you nothing (why do you do it? Is it a requirement for another job that does pay?) and costs you time, effort and patients.
But to bitch at the interpreters for what they earn — or rather, cost! really isn’t productive or helpful. And it makes you mad which then interferes with your ability to treat the mayan speaker and treat the interpreter with the same respect you’d grant a nurse or EMT.
You posted the link for the interpretive service that quotes $3.99/minute. This strikes me as pretty unrealistic. In the first place, that’s what the agency is charging you; not what they pay the interpreter. And I can assure you that the interpreter does not get that. However, easy common languages like my spanish earn low dollars, rare languages such as Maya and Cambodian earn much more–they are rare! So if they quote that global price, they aren’t being honest. Or they are *really* stiffing their interpreters.
But I’m sure your nurse, the EMTs, the lab technicians, the receptionist, the supervisor in the ER are also making money. Your comment in the original blog Wishful thinking. At $4 per minute, the translators are making way more money than the doctors who treat the patients. simply demonstrates a complete lack of understanding of the world of working as a contractor and sub-contractor. SHould any of them actually get paid $4/minute, I’ll bet you oranges to apples that they work less than 100 minutes a month. And they’d sure like better pay or more hours.

By: Matt

Matt — Thu, 03 May 2012 02:11:28 +0000

If the situation were “dollar of profit=dollar of reduction in premiums” I would understand. But that’s not how a mutual works. Those profits can just as easily be distributed as dividends, or kept as retained earnings.

Either way, those profits do not constitute a “cost” to the system.

By: throckmorton

throckmorton — Wed, 02 May 2012 19:22:01 +0000

matt:

Our “insurance company” is a mutual. If the premiums generate interest, our costs go down.

By: throckmorton

throckmorton — Wed, 02 May 2012 19:20:18 +0000

Mr. Salmon:

Cost: have to cancel clinic suddenly and run to ED to see intoxicated individual from guatamala whose family only speaks a Myan dialect. I am not being paid, infact, I lost all the productivity of my clinic and practice to take care of this person who was shot when his drug deal went bad. I am paying to take care of this individual. I also have to pay the cost of the translator if the patient does well and is able to come to post-op appointments.

By: SeaSpray

SeaSpray — Wed, 02 May 2012 01:44:51 +0000

Clever jokes!

Thor …that’s especially funny!. Okay ..not that it would REALLY be funny ..of course …but, what can I say …I loved the Far Side cartoons.

Now, I’m imagining what other med specialties could do.

By: DensityDuck

DensityDuck — Tue, 01 May 2012 19:59:09 +0000

but I can't stop eating, you don't understand, I can't stop it's too hard I have these cravings and I just caaaaaaaaaaaaaaan't