An Example of a Hospital Program

This St. Louis hospital hired a group of Bosnian and Hispanic workers to fill positions in Housekeeping, Food Service, and Material Handling departments. The hospital found that these workers:

• Had a strong work ethic
• Were reliable
• Were less likely to go elsewhere at the drop of a hat

However, the hospital soon found the effectiveness of these workers to be limited due to language barriers. The following were observed:

• Communication with visitors, patients, co-workers, and managers was lacking
• Assignments were sometimes misunderstood or managers intent was misconstrued
• Hospital policies and procedures were incorrectly interpreted on occasion

To address these problems the hospital adopted our ESL Training Solution. We conducted bi-weekly 2-hour class sessions at the hospital. The classes addressed specific areas of the hospital's concern. Classes concentrated on topics such as:

• Safety training - fire, disposal of infectious waste, proper lifting techniques, general disaster preparedness
• Service training - Who is a customer?
• Directions for visitors
• Dialogue for interacting with co-workers, managers, and visitors
• Hospital vocabulary
• American culture
• Grammar aimed at enhancing conversational competency
• Group discussions about the hospital's commitment to them
• Encouragement to apply for other positions within the hospital

The Results: Within the first 6 weeks department managers were hearing feedback regarding increased communication competency from nursing supervisors not even associated with the program. The workers commented that they feel more competent in their role and a strong sense of gratitude to the hospital. Attendance rates for this hospital program, as with all of our programs have been extremely high, and feedback at all organizational levels has been outstanding.

View excerpt from St. Anthony's Medical Center “Spotlight”.