Introduction
When a pandemic struck the US, this major government contractor needed a language partner that could move quickly. Here’s how Propio delivered critical interpreting services for limited English, deaf and hard of hearing patients.
When COVID-19 cases began to surge in the United States in the spring of 2020, this major American government contractor was tasked with the urgent assignment to convert a large urban convention center into a 400-bed field hospital specifically for the treatment of COVID-19 patients.
The Challenge
Typically, localization and remote interpretation onboarding assignments take up to 30 days to implement; however, Propio recognized the urgency of this project and created a special task force to support an accelerated timeline for the opening of the COVID-19 field hospital. This team worked around the clock and was able to rapidly deploy both Over-the-Phone (OPI) and Video Remote Interpreting (VRI) services.
The implementation team was comprised of executives and directors across many of Propio’s business units, including interpretation, client engagement and customer care.
The team also included a director-level employee from the Client Engagement Team, who coordinated the onboarding effort. This individual possessed a strong scientific and medical background with a Ph.D. in forensic and social psychology, along with prior experience in healthcare and clinical trials. This brought an additional dimension of expertise to the project implementation process. The collaboration across multiple business units supported the project’s accelerated timeline and ensured quality patient care.
The Solution
Propio’s fast and reliable OPI technology and vast network of highly qualified interpreters provided the ideal solution for overcoming the challenges facing the healthcare provider. Propio’s customizable OPI dashboard allows clients to tailor the data collection to meet their needs. The Propio team worked very closely with the healthcare provider in order to determine exactly which data points they wanted collected and then adapted the OPI dashboard to fit these requests.
Propio’s network of thousands of medically qualified interpreters supported the efficiency and confidentiality of the calls. Propio’s interpreter network is industry leading in language skills, understanding of cultural nuances and knowledge of the US government and healthcare structure. These qualities ensure that calls are effectively interpreted and that the needs of each caller are successfully met.
Proven Results
The partnership between the healthcare consortium and Propio resulted in a 10% reduction in average call handle times. The efficiency of the OPI service was driven by two factors:
- Propio’s fast and reliable technology
- The high quality and medically qualified network of interpreters
Additionally, the average interpreter connection time for the calls was 15 seconds for Spanish and 25 seconds for all other languages. Propio’s OPI service supported the healthcare provider’s high call volumes, met the organization’s unique data collection requirements, and ensured all calls were HIPAA-compliant.
