title: Language barriers in the community pharmacy: a survey of northern and western Auckland.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Community pharmacists play an important role in increasing patient understanding of medication use. Lack of resources to facilitate communication with non-English speaking (NES) patients may be a communication barrier.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  To identify obstacles and coping strategies of community pharmacists when counselling NES patients in Auckland's North Shore and West Auckland.
  
  
  METHODS
  A cross-sectional survey of 46 community pharmacies in West Auckland and the northern Auckland region was carried out in February 2009.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Community pharmacists frequently counsel NES patients (65% reported at least once a week). Use of bilingual staff was the most commonly employed strategy (78% of respondents) to communicate with these customers. Pharmacies that reported serving NES clients at least daily all had bilingual staff, compared with 70% of pharmacies with less frequent NES contact (p=0.017). No pharmacists reported using professional interpreting services. In our sample, telephone interpreting was the most preferred (63% of respondents) method of communicating with such patients, assuming that further services were made available.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Community pharmacists frequently serve NES patients, with limited access to interpreting services or translated resources. Although pharmacists have, in some way, adapted to the needs of their patients, our survey suggests that accessible professional interpreting services would further improve pharmacist/NES client interaction.
authors.affiliation: Starship Children's Health, Auckland City Hospital, PB 92024, Auckland 1124, New Zealand. echang@adhb.govt.nz
authors.forename: Emily
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Chang
authors.forename: Bobby
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Tsang
authors.forename: Simon
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Thornley
mesh_terms: D002755:Choice Behavior; D003144:Communication Barriers; D003157:Community Pharmacy Services / Q000458:organization & administration*; D003376:Counseling; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D003625:Data Collection; D006295:Health Resources / Q000600:supply & distribution*; D006801:Humans; D007802:Language; D008508:Medication Errors / Q000517:prevention & control; D019303:Multilingualism; D009520:New Zealand; D010353:Patient Education as Topic; D010595:Pharmacists / Q000523:psychology*; D011369:Professional-Patient Relations; D014175:Translating