Oh Goodness No Hablo Espanol

Well, Friday was my day to stay late at the hospital.  (By late I mean that the other students left at 4 and I stayed until 6, so not really that late.)  Well at 4 we get a call from the ER that there is a patient to be admitted.  For me, this means that I have to go and get the patient's history.  Not a big deal right, or so I thought.  Well, when I get down there and go to see the patient, I find out that not only is this going to be a long complicated process from a medical standpoint, but we don't even speak the same language.  Oh joy.  He speaks only Spanish after moving to this country from Mexico to OKC 3 years ago so that he and his wife could be closer to his daughter and son-in-law.  Well, I should say that he speaks as much English as I speak Spanish.  So we are off to a great start already.  Then his son-in-law comes in to be the translator.  So that's good.  That's helpful.  Well, after we get started, I find out that his son-in-law works construction, and doesn't know what a lot of the everyday terms that we use in medicine.  For example, hepatitis is lost on him.  So i'm trying to explain to someone in English so that he can explain to someone in Spanish and then explain back to me what was said in Spanish in English in a way that I can understand.  As you can imagine, this took a very long time.  

So, the lesson that I learned:
Forensic pathology is still the way to go.  No language barriers there. 
Don't use anyone but a medical translator (which are few and far between and very expensive to use, so scratch that idea)
Make sure that you don't draw the short straw on a Friday to stay late.