Hey, guys! I’ve been on a roll lately taking agency jobs (after many years of not working for an agency), and many of them have been for physical therapy appointments. As a full-time interpreter, I worked a lot with physical therapists, both in the inpatient and outpatient settings, and I forgot how cool the therapists are, and how tough the interpreting can be! I’ve put together a short list of tips that might help if you’re preparing to interpret in physical therapy.
Open bay transparency: The interpreting I’ve been doing lately takes place in a big open room, where the therapist seeing the patient is interacting with other therapists and other patients (as opposed to having a conversation exclusively with just the one patient I’m assigned to). In one case, my patient was chatting with another patient next to her–in Spanish. Being transparent can be tough, but it can be done, and there’s not just one way to do it! Continue reading “Mouth Up and Mouth Down: Interpreting in Physical Therapy”
