TY - JOUR T1 - Interpreters: why should the NHS provide them? JF - British Journal of General Practice JO - Br J Gen Pract SP - 564 LP - 565 DO - 10.3399/bjgp18X699905 VL - 68 IS - 677 AU - David Lehane AU - Peter Campion Y1 - 2018/12/01 UR - http://bjgp.org/content/68/677/564.abstract N2 - In the UK, as in most other high-income countries in the 21st century, a significant proportion of the population does not have English as their first language, nor is adequately proficient in it. Any encounter with a doctor who does not speak their language (and some do) then depends on some sort of interpretation. Language competence becomes increasingly important as the degree of patient involvement increases, reaching its peak in encounters involving mental illness, matters of behaviour and motivation, and explaining somatic symptoms, where nuances of meaning and subtleties of expression make the difference between shared understanding and total communication failure. All these are the bread and butter of general practice.Patients need to have their complaint understood, and need to understand the doctor’s diagnosis, prognosis, and proffered treatment. Doctors need reciprocally to understand each patient’s problems, including, in the patient-centred model, their ideas, concerns, and expectations, while seeking to ensure that their diagnosis and management plans are understood, are related to the patient’s ideas and beliefs, and that there is agreement about ensuring that the best action follows, often called ‘concordance’.1 Given the huge effort over the past 50 years in research and teaching directed towards achieving such ‘patient centredness’ when there is a common language,2 it is surprising that so little has been done to address the added barrier of not sharing a common language or culturally-related health beliefs.3,4In his exhaustive systematic review of 36 articles,3 Flores concluded: ‘... available evidence suggests … ER -