Policy Manual sample

MDT Home Health Care Agency, Inc. HANDLING BARRIERS TO COMMUNICATION POLICY AND PROCEDURE POLICY: Provision of care/service to patients and families with communication or language barriers Accessibility : Information will be provided to patients in plain language and in a manner that is accessible and timely to: 1) Persons with disabilities, including accessible web sites and the provision of auxiliary aids and services at no cost to the individual in accordance with the Americans with Disabilities Act and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act. 2) Persons with limited English proficiency through the provision of language services at no cost to the individual, including oral interpretation and/or written translations. The Agency will help the provision of care/service to patients and families from various cultural backgrounds, beliefs, and languages. Communicate to patient and families of different nationalities. Definition: Communication is the passing of information from one person to another. MDT Home Health Care Agency, Inc. accepts patients for care and services regardless of race, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, or disability. Cultural and ethnic considerations and personal preferences of all patients shall be respected. MDT Home Health Care Agency, Inc. utilizes resources from within and when necessary from outside the Agency to communicate clearly and effectively with patients with special communication needs. To assure the goals to improve the help to clients/family with language barriers: 1. Staff communicates with the patient in a language or form understandable to the patient (we will employ bilingual staff if possible) , our Agency facilitates communication by interpreters, form translations and other communication aids when communication barriers are present. 2. It is the intent of our Agency to fully inform all patients of benefits, rights, and consent to treatment. Therefore, our Agency has established special procedures to ensure that patients who have either visual or hearing impairment, or who do not speak English, are informed of their rights and consent to treatment. Purpose: To ensure that patients who speak a non-English language or those with visual or hearing impairments receive full service. Procedure: Patient who do not speak English: 1. Our Agency will attempt to assign a staff member who speaks the patient’s language to the care of the patient. 2. If the staff member do not speak the patient’s language, they schedule visits, if at all possible, when a family member or friend will be present to interpret for the patient and the staff member. 3. The Director of Nursing, Clinical Manager maintains a list of qualified language interpreters for the languages most frequently spoken in the coverage area of the Agency. Home Health Agency Policies A-73