ED PT Red Flag Questions - In Spanish

Meet Alejandro Fernandez, a future SPT at NAU.

Bio:

Alejandro is a driven and passionate individual who graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in Kinesiology and a minor in Spanish from Arizona State University. With a deep desire to impact his community and healthcare, Alejandro is currently pursuing his medical interpretation license and will be starting his Doctorate of Physical Therapy degree at Northern Arizona University!

Throughout his life, Alejandro saw the disparities in the quality of care that his family received that were mainly due to the language and cultural barriers. These experiences inspire him to create resources for professionals in physical therapy to learn Spanish specific to the field in hopes to help to bridge the communication gap between healthcare providers and patients.

Alejandro’s ultimate goal is to provide more accessible resources to improve physical and mental well being of those in his community. In his free time he enjoys traveling throughout Latin America, reading, and hiking Arizona’s beautiful trails. He hopes to serve a resource for professionals in the field and mentor for future generations to come.

Hear From Alejandro

My name is Alejandro, I help healthcare professionals in physical therapy confidently serve their patients that speak Spanish. My mission is to help others provide better quality of care by improving communication and understanding by teaching Spanish specific to Physical Therapy in any way that saves time, is applicable, and is enjoyable.

Thank you to Alejandro for taking his time to contribute to our blog this week and help us enhance our communication for patient quality and safety. Please note that best practice is to always use a qualified interpreter when working with patients that you do not share a common language. However, if you currently use Spanish in your clinical practice, we’ve taken common red flag questions based on the work by Leerar et al (2007) and asked Alejandro to provide translations for your reference! (Please note, he is not yet a licensed medical interpreter.)

In the Emergency Department screening for red flags as part of your differential diagnosis process is crucial. Here are some specific questions with their Spanish translations.