Reaching the Hispanic Community

Based on different statistics I saw today, it is clear that a healthcare strategy for reaching the Hispanic community is needed. Just looking at what I see being done:

• Some companies are building out a “language flag” in their databases to allow members to choose the language for communication.
  • This works a lot better than “guessing” based on their last name.
• Some companies are offering Spanish and English versions of print documents.
  • It may exist, but I haven’t seen any companies allowing a member to “toggle” their website between English and Spanish.
• Some companies doing calls offer patients the ability to choose Spanish during the automated call (i.e., Spanish on the fly).
  • These could be offered to every member or only to members in zipcodes with a high concentration of Spanish speakers.
• An older solution which exists many places is hiring call center staff that are bi-lingual.
  • And many companies use the AT&T language line to support less common languages.

But, the key is that you should have some strategy and be working towards improving it and understanding the differences in that population segment.