End of Year Report
Sept 12th, 2007
A. Group Name: SALUD
B. List of officers for the past year (Position, Name, Email address)
1. Coordinator, Andres Turner turner.andres@medstudent.pitt.edu
2. Coordinator, Vanessa Cortes de Jorge
cortesdejorge.vaness@medstudent.pitt.edu
3. Coordinator, Priya Gursahaney Gursahaney.priya@medstudent.pitt.edu
C. List of officers for the upcoming year (Position, Name, Email address)
1. Coordinator, Alejandra Camacho Soto
camachosoto.alejandr@medstudent.pitt.edu
2. Coordinator, Claudia Ramirez Ramirez.claudia@medstudent.pitt.edu
3. Coordinator, Meera Sheffrin sheffrin.meera@medstudent.pitt.edu
D. Group goals for the past year
1. Coordinate and integrate existing community resources to participate in and
address the health care needs of Latinos in Allegheny County
2. Provide medical, health education, and interpreter /translation services to the
uninsured Latino community.
3. Provide courses in medical Spanish for those who have underlying Spanish
language skills.
4. Train medical students to serve as medical interpreters and provide medical
students with the opportunity to gain clinical exposure and participate in the care
of Latino and other community members
5. To encourage communication between students and faculty who have an interest
in serving the Latino community
E. Estimated group membership for the past year (If membership includes more than
just medical students, please provide a breakdown): 60 (38 medical students + 22
community volunteer interpreters)
F. Regularly scheduled events, meetings, etc. (Include brief descriptions, costs, and
attendance)
1. Monthly medical Spanish workshops- lunchtime meetings where students
learned new medical Spanish vocabulary. Cost: $0. Average Attendance: 15
2. Monthly officers meeting – Organizational and planning meeting. Cost: $0.
Attendance: 3.
3. Monthly meetings with HOEP student coordinators and administrators – Assess
the progress of the organization and the future events. Cost: $0. Attendance: 12
G. Other events, meetings, etc. (Include dates, brief descriptions, costs, and
attendance)
1. October 28, 2006. SALUD Language Skills Assessment and Cultural
Competency Training– A 6 hour training to assess the language skills of new
volunteers and go over cultural competency specific to the Latino community and
the code of ethics for interpreting. Breakfast and Lunch provided. Cost: $500.
Attendance: 25.
2. April 23, 2007. Coffee-shop Spanish – Informal discussion of a medical article in
Spanish with a physician and medical students Cost: $0. Attendance: 5.
3. October 6, 2006. Mental Health Lunch-time talk. A panel of physicians from
WPIC. Cost ~$300. Attendance: 60 people
4. October 2006 – Al Servicio de la Comunidad – set up a booth at the community
fair for Latinos in Pittsburgh to provide blood pressure and glucose screenings
and refer patients to our clinic Cost: $60. Attendance: 25
5. January 2007 – represented SALUD at an Pitt undergraduate international fair.
Cost: $0 Attendance: 50.
H. Summary (In your own words, sum up successes and shortcomings of the
year and whether or not goals were met, emphasizing the impact of the
group on the medical student community)
One of our main successes for this year is the initiation of SALUD interpreter
training. The main training was done in the fall of 2006 for medical students and
community volunteers, and we held an abbreviated training in July 2007 for community
volunteers to cover interpreter shortages this summer. The training focused on cultural
competency, code of ethics, interpreting skills, and language skills, all of which help to
improve patient safety as well as medical student knowledge. Training and screening
interpreters is important for patient safety and improves the interpreting quality that we
provide. Most hospital systems have a formal department for providing interpreters,
whereas here we medical students provide much of the interpreting for the Latino
community though the Birmingham clinic.
Another accomplishment was initiating and implementing a shadowing program
at the Birmingham clinic, to give those who are not yet comfortable interpreting on their
own an opportunity to observe and learn. We also raised awareness of health care
issues concerning an important underserved population in both Pittsburgh and the U.S.,
provided medical students the opportunity to learn medical Spanish which, and
expanded our services at the Birmingham clinic.
As for our shortcomings, we were not as consistent with Medical Spanish as
would like to be. We consider this both a success and an area we can improve on. we
started this in only a limited capacity this year, but we were able to develop a solid
framework on which to build from. We would like to have more incorporation of students
from other schools and programs to diversify our services and learning opportunities. In
addition, we had planned a second SALUD training for the spring with did not come to
fruition due to logistics. We still still want to expand our organization if possible,
although that is dependent on the number of people proficiency in Spanish.
In addition to what is mentioned above, SALUD has had a significant impact on
the medical school though increasing awareness of the health needs of the Latino
community, via attendance at lunch time talks and participation in medical Spanish. In
addition we participated in the 90K for 2009 renovation of the Birmingham clinic, which
benefits SALUD as much as clinic itself considering large number of patients are Latino.
SALUD had a very successful year last year and we have room for improvement for an
even better year to come.