The Program for Language Equity (PLE) aims to advance language equity in research, clinical care, and medical education by transforming research and health care delivery to include and prioritize individuals who speak languages other than English (LOE). Language equity refers to the principle and practice of ensuring that every person — regardless of their language skills or preference — has equal access to information, resources, and opportunities to help them achieve their best health and overall well-being.
Our mission is to improve language equity within Boston Children’s and across other pediatric hospitals in the nation.
Through a dynamic blend of research, education, and advocacy, PLE is informing researchers, hospitals, and funders to help elevate their standards of practice to provide exemplary language access services — from interpretation and translation to patient and community engagement and conducting research. We believe improving language equity and access will ultimately improve the rigor and representativeness of health care research, as well as the quality of health care for all.
Why the emphasis on language?
Even though there is a federal mandate stating that recipients of federal funding (including hospitals and universities) must provide meaningful access to individuals who speak languages other than English (LOE), this mandate has not been widely enforced — whether in clinical care or in research. As a result, there have been dire consequences.
Patients and families who speak LOE have higher rates of adverse events, hospital-acquired infections, readmissions, and other negative outcomes.
More than 90 percent of clinical research in the U.S. includes only English-speaking participants. This exclusion limits generalizability, representativeness, and the validity of findings. It also creates individual and systemic bias, and contributes to the mistrust of research among multilingual communities.
Research indicates that patients who speak LOE often experience worse health outcomes and hospital experiences than those who do not speak LOE.
