Abstract
Like Canada, Wales, UK is a bilingual nation: the Welsh language is an important part of its national identity and legislative framework. This has implications for the delivery of public sector services, particularly in the context of health and social care, where responding to the language needs of service users is fundamental to quality health care provision. Nevertheless, despite the strengthening policy commitment for a whole-system approach towards enhancing Welsh language services, there is a paucity of evidence to guide best practice in organizational planning in health care settings.
This commentary outlines the context and significance of bilingual health care provision in Wales and the implications for building and embedding the evidence base. It calls for further work to translate our knowledge and understanding of language-appropriate practice to provide more effective and sensitive health care services; and to close the implementation gap between evidence and practice. Given the relevance of this challenge for health care providers in Canada who plan and deliver services for French-language minorities, this approach has resonance across our research communities. Thus, in our common pursuit to establish integrated knowledge translation research for language-appropriate health care systems, this commentary offers a focus for reflection, discussion and collaborative action.
Résumé
Tout comme le Canada, le pays de Galles, au Royaume-Uni, est une nation bilingue: la langue galloise est un élément important de son identité nationale et de son cadre législatif. Cette situation a des implications pour la prestation de services publics, en particulier dans le domaine des services sociaux et de santé, où il est essentiel de répondre aux besoins linguistiques des utilisateurs de services pour assurer des soins de qualité. Néanmoins, en dépit de l’engagement politique pour offrir davantage de services sociaux et de santé en gallois, on manque d’éléments qui orienteraient l’élaboration de pratiques exemplaires en matière de planification et d’organisation des services de santé.
Ce commentaire décrit le contexte et l’importance de la prestation des soins de santé bilingues au Pays de Galles et les prérequis pour élaborer et intégrer une base de données probantes. Il appelle à davantage transférer et appliquer les connaissances acquises sur la pratique dans la langue appropriée pour fournir des services de santé plus efficaces et adaptés, et combler le fossé qui existe actuellement au niveau de la mise en œuvre entre la recherche et la pratique. Compte tenu de la pertinence de ce défi pour les fournisseurs de soins de santé au Canada qui planifient et fournissent des services pour les minorités de langue française, cette approche a une certaine résonnance dans nos communautés de recherche. Ainsi, dans notre quête commune de recherche et de transfert des connaissances pour mettre en place des systèmes de santé dans la langue appropriée, ce commentaire propose une mise au point pour la réflexion, la discussion et l’action en collaboration.
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Acknowledgements: The ELAN project is funded by the National Institute for Social Care and Health Research, Welsh Government.
Conflict of Interest: None to declare.
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Roberts, G.W., Burton, C.R. Implementing the Evidence for Language-appropriate Health Care Systems: The Welsh Context. Can J Public Health 104 (Suppl 6), S88–S90 (2013). https://doi.org/10.17269/cjph.104.3496
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.17269/cjph.104.3496