The professional interpreter's effect on empathic communication in medical consultations: A qualitative analysis of interaction.
OBJECTIVE
To investigate how empathic communication is expressed in interpreter-mediated consultations (IMCs) and the interpreter's effect on it.


METHODS
We coded 20 authentic video-recorded IMCs by using the Empathic Communication Coding System (ECCS). We compared patient-initiated empathic opportunities (EOs) and doctors' responses as expressed by patients and doctors and as rendered by interpreters.


RESULTS
We identified 44 EOs. In 2 of the 44 EOs there was a close match in the way the EOs were expressed by the patient in the first place and in the way they were rendered by the interpreter. Twenty-four of the 44 EOs that were passed on by the interpreter to the doctor and presented the doctor with an opportunity to respond, came with a shift in meaning and/or intensity. Twenty of the 44 EOs were not passed on by the interpreter to the doctor.


CONCLUSION
In IMCs, EOs are subject to the interpreter's renditions and the doctor's actions during interaction.


PRACTICE IMPLICATIONS
Doctors and interpreters require skills to detect patient cues, assess them correctly, render them completely and in an appropriate manner (interpreters) and display communicative behaviours that take into account the intricacies of interpreter-mediated clinical communication and facilitate each other's communicative goals.
['Krystallidou|Demi|D|', 'Bylund|Carma L|CL|', 'Pype|Peter|P|']
D000328:Adult D000488:Allied Health Personnel D003142:Communication D003144:Communication Barriers D054521:Cultural Competency D004645:Empathy D005260:Female D006801:Humans D008297:Male D008875:Middle Aged D019303:Multilingualism D010817:Physician-Patient Relations D010820:Physicians D024382:Professional Role D011369:Professional-Patient Relations D012017:Referral and Consultation D014741:Video Recording
Interpreter ECCS Communication barriers Empathy Interaction analysis Interprofessional education Interprofessional relations Language barriers Translation