CMI Informed Consent and Patient Rights 2 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: The Patient Self-Determination Act (PSDA) requires healthcare facilities to inform patients about their right to:
- Choose their preferred interpreter
- Make advance directives such as living wills and healthcare proxies (Correct answer)
- Request itemized billing statements
- Access their medical records immediately
Correct answer: Make advance directives such as living wills and healthcare proxies
The PSDA requires facilities to inform patients about advance directive options upon admission, ensuring they can document future healthcare wishes.
Question 2: An interpreter is asked to interpret a Do-Not-Resuscitate (DNR) order discussion with a patient. The interpreter's role is to:
- Express personal opinions about DNR orders to help the patient decide
- Interpret the discussion accurately and completely, including all clinical and ethical dimensions (Correct answer)
- Summarize the key points only to reduce patient distress
- Defer the discussion until a family member can be present
Correct answer: Interpret the discussion accurately and completely, including all clinical and ethical dimensions
DNR discussions require complete, accurate interpretation; the patient's understanding and autonomy depend on full information access.
Question 3: A patient requests that their interpreter help them understand the hospital's patient bill of rights. The interpreter should:
- Read and explain the document independently as a service to the patient
- Sight-translate the document for the patient and suggest they direct questions to patient advocacy staff (Correct answer)
- Decline because this is not a clinical interpreting task
- Give the patient a written translation instead
Correct answer: Sight-translate the document for the patient and suggest they direct questions to patient advocacy staff
Sight translating the bill of rights and directing questions to advocacy staff is within scope while maintaining appropriate role boundaries.
Question 4: Which of the following represents a violation of a patient's right to language access?
- Offering both telephone and in-person interpreting options
- Requiring a patient to bring their own interpreter to receive care (Correct answer)
- Providing a qualified interpreter at no cost to the patient
- Informing the patient of available language services upon admission
Correct answer: Requiring a patient to bring their own interpreter to receive care
Requiring patients to provide their own interpreters violates language access rights under Title VI and other federal standards.
Question 5: A patient in acute pain attempts to sign a surgical consent form. The provider should ensure the interpreter conveys that:
- Pain automatically renders a patient incompetent to consent
- The patient should have an opportunity to understand the consent while adequately comfortable (Correct answer)
- Consent can be obtained later after surgery if pain is present
- A family member must consent on the patient's behalf when pain is present
Correct answer: The patient should have an opportunity to understand the consent while adequately comfortable
Severe pain may compromise decision-making capacity; ensuring the patient can understand and consent comfortably is an ethical requirement.
Question 6: A patient asks the interpreter to help them file a complaint against the provider after a session. The interpreter should:
- Help the patient file the complaint as a patient advocate
- Explain the patient's rights under hospital complaint procedures and direct them to patient relations staff (Correct answer)
- Advise the patient not to file the complaint to avoid conflict
- Discuss the complaint with the provider on the patient's behalf
Correct answer: Explain the patient's rights under hospital complaint procedures and direct them to patient relations staff
Informing patients about their rights and directing them to appropriate resources is within the interpreter's advocacy role without crossing professional boundaries.
CMI Informed Consent and Patient Rights 2
The Patient Self-Determination Act (PSDA) requires healthcare facilities to inform patients about their right to: