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| | SB2929 Engrossed | | LRB098 12809 RPM 47296 b |
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| 1 | | AN ACT concerning health facilities.
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| 2 | | Be it enacted by the People of the State of Illinois,
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| 3 | | represented in the General Assembly:
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| 4 | | Section 5. The Language Assistance Services Act is amended |
| 5 | | by changing Section 15 as follows:
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| 6 | | (210 ILCS 87/15)
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| 7 | | Sec. 15. Language assistance services. |
| 8 | | (a) To insure access to
health care information and |
| 9 | | services for
limited-English-speaking or non-English-speaking |
| 10 | | residents and deaf residents,
a health facility must do the |
| 11 | | following:
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| 12 | | (1) Adopt and review annually a policy for providing |
| 13 | | language assistance
services to patients with language or |
| 14 | | communication barriers. The policy shall
include |
| 15 | | procedures for providing, to the extent possible as |
| 16 | | determined by the
facility, the use of an interpreter |
| 17 | | whenever a language or communication
barrier
exists, |
| 18 | | except where the patient, after being informed of the |
| 19 | | availability of
the interpreter service, chooses to use a |
| 20 | | family member or friend who
volunteers to interpret. The |
| 21 | | procedures shall be designed to maximize
efficient use of |
| 22 | | interpreters and minimize delays in providing interpreters |
| 23 | | to
patients. The procedures shall insure, to the extent |
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| 1 | | possible as determined
by the facility, that
interpreters |
| 2 | | are available, either on the premises or accessible by |
| 3 | | telephone,
24 hours a day. The facility shall annually |
| 4 | | transmit to the Department of
Public Health a
copy of the |
| 5 | | updated policy and shall include a description of the |
| 6 | | facility's
efforts to
insure adequate and speedy |
| 7 | | communication between patients with language or
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| 8 | | communication barriers and staff.
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| 9 | | (2) Develop, and post in conspicuous locations, |
| 10 | | notices that advise patients
and their families of the |
| 11 | | availability of interpreters, the procedure for
obtaining |
| 12 | | an interpreter, and the telephone numbers to call for |
| 13 | | filing
complaints concerning interpreter service problems, |
| 14 | | including, but not limited
to, a
TTY number for persons who |
| 15 | | are deaf or hard of hearing. The notices shall be posted, |
| 16 | | at a
minimum, in the emergency room, the admitting area, |
| 17 | | the facility entrance, and
the
outpatient area. Notices |
| 18 | | shall inform patients that interpreter services are
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| 19 | | available on request, shall list the languages most |
| 20 | | commonly encountered at the facility for which interpreter |
| 21 | | services
are available, and shall instruct patients to |
| 22 | | direct complaints regarding
interpreter services to the |
| 23 | | Department of Public Health, including the
telephone
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| 24 | | numbers to call for that purpose.
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| 25 | | (3) Notify the facility's employees of the language |
| 26 | | services available at the facility and train them on how to |
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| 1 | | make those language services available to patients.
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| 2 | | (b) In addition, a health facility may do one or more of |
| 3 | | the following: |
| 4 | | (1) Identify and record a patient's primary language |
| 5 | | and dialect on one or more of the following: a patient |
| 6 | | medical chart, hospital bracelet, bedside notice, or |
| 7 | | nursing card. |
| 8 | | (2) Prepare and maintain, as needed, a list of |
| 9 | | interpreters who have been identified as proficient in sign |
| 10 | | language according to the Interpreters for the Deaf Act and |
| 11 | | a list of the languages of the population of the |
| 12 | | geographical area served by the facility.
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| 13 | | (3) Review all standardized written forms, waivers, |
| 14 | | documents, and
informational materials available to |
| 15 | | patients on admission to determine which
to translate into |
| 16 | | languages other than English.
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| 17 | | (4) Consider providing its nonbilingual staff with |
| 18 | | standardized picture and
phrase sheets for use in routine |
| 19 | | communications with patients who have language
or |
| 20 | | communication barriers.
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| 21 | | (5) Develop community liaison groups to enable the |
| 22 | | facility and the
limited-English-speaking, |
| 23 | | non-English-speaking, and deaf communities to insure
the |
| 24 | | adequacy of the
interpreter services.
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| 25 | | (c) Notwithstanding the provisions of subsections (a) and |
| 26 | | (b) of this Section, a hospital that services an area where 10% |