After a trip to Mexico and talking to the Firefighters over there, or "Bomberos" as they call themselves, I became curious as to know...

How many of you have ever been faced with a language barrier, and how did it affect the incident?

What do you do if you're faced with someone who speaks little to no English in an emergency, who do you call?

Does your department carry those quick reference sheets made specially for EMS and Fire?

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LOLOLOLOLOL Thanks, I keep try to keep up hope.
EXACTLY - lots more ways to communicate than we ever acknowledge

think of babies... they have no prejudices...
but they really like that SSSSHHHHHHH sound - LOL - What language of origin is that from?

and those babies really like to be rocked and like bouncing... as a form of communication... we should start rocking and bouncing all of our patients

and those babies like their backs rubbed and patted... so we should start rubbing and patting the backs of all patients... or at least our cranky colleagues
Excellent examples - and yes, even basic sign language gestures beyond the alphabet will come in handy many times in life.

And writing out words on paper works well when a person has a mouth or throat injury or airway management devices in place. Served me well on dozens of scenes. Pencils work even better than pens in some environments.

I know that some variation on charades also works in a pinch.
btw "you are right" is my all-time favorite phrase - so feel free to sing that mantra often - since some of the others on this site have not yet fully embraced that sentiment... but I am winning them over one at a time ;-)
LOL... good one.
Oui, vous êtes correct mais ne traduit pas pour ces gars, pour moi vous pouvez le partir en français je peux lire mieux que je peux parler maintenant.. : o)) and yes you are wicked cool.. Merci
Is F_uck an English word?

Me thinks its origin is from elsewhere... hmmm

So you are yelling at them in a non-English language to get out ???
Holes in your story, dude !
Mon Français suce, je doit employer l'anglais la plupart du temps. Désolé. Heureux de vous avoir autour. Désolé vous avez eu une perte patiente due aux barrières linguistiques, c'est dur et devrait ne jamais se produire. J'ai parié dans un délai de 10 ans, États-Unis soyez beaucoup plus riche avec beaucoup plus de langues étant employées dans chaque communauté.

and

There is an old saying "When in Rome, do as the Romans do" - so we all must try to adapt to whatever environment we are in.

See you around the pages.
Lady Heather René
you are an optimist and it's refreshing, Thanks for the reply Heather
Yea, there are all kinds of language barriers. Ha,ha! Great story, Craig.
Despite how you feel about immigration...learning the other language(s) spoken in your community is a valuable tool on the job. I have been on a call where the only information your getting is a frantic man saying, "Baby, sick" and he's pointing at a 5 yr. old boy. That's not ever fun...

--Bilingual Dust
That word is not English?? That is the only word the kids in town can spell with paint.

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