UMMS Affiliation
Department of Family Medicine and Community Health
Publication Date
2018-11
Document Type
Article
Disciplines
Communication Sciences and Disorders | Emergency Medicine | Health Communication | Health Services Administration | Health Services Research | Medical Education | Otorhinolaryngologic Diseases
Abstract
Approximately 23% of Americans over age 12 have some level of hearing loss.1 Emergency departments can reduce healthcare barriers for deaf and hard-of-hearing (DHoH) patients through improved patient-physician communication. DHoH students, once they become physicians, may provide one mechanism for reducing existing healthcare disparities and communication barriers for DHoH patients, and may be more adept with patients facing other communication barriers. A renewed interest in disability access and a commitment to social justice has increased efforts toward the inclusion of individuals with disabilities in medical education and training. Despite this increased interest and a growing number of DHoH students entering medical education, DHoH students continue to be dissuaded from specialty careers such as emergency medicine (EM) over concerns regarding effective communication and ability. Given the academic medicine communities' commitment to diversity, a recounting of the successful inclusion of DHoH students in EM can benefit medical education and practice. In this account, the authors reflect on the successful experiences of a visiting DHoH medical student in an academic EM rotation at a Level I trauma hospital that serves a diverse population, and they identify the potential challenges for DHoH students in an EM setting, offer solutions including reasonable accommodations, and provide commentary on the legal requirements for providing full and equal access for DHoH students. We secured permission from the student to share the contents of this article prior to publication.
Keywords
hearing loss, medical students, emergency medicine, patient-physician communication
Rights and Permissions
Copyright: © 2018 Meeks et al. This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) License. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
DOI of Published Version
10.5811/westjem.2018.8.38550
Source
West J Emerg Med. 2018 Nov;19(6):1014-1018. doi: 10.5811/westjem.2018.8.38550. Epub 2018 Oct 10. Link to article on publisher's site
Journal/Book/Conference Title
The western journal of emergency medicine
Related Resources
PubMed ID
30429935
Repository Citation
Meeks, Lisa M.; Engelman, Alina; Booth, Alicia; and Argenyi, Michael, "Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing Learners in Emergency Medicine" (2018). Open Access Articles. 3634.
https://escholarship.umassmed.edu/oapubs/3634
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Included in
Communication Sciences and Disorders Commons, Emergency Medicine Commons, Health Communication Commons, Health Services Administration Commons, Health Services Research Commons, Medical Education Commons, Otorhinolaryngologic Diseases Commons