Accents

[validquestion]

Ok, I have name changed for this in case it is too sensitive...

I work with a few people who have very strong accents, but otherwise fluent English, and at times I and others really struggle to understand what they say (after asking them to repeat themselves a couple of times I just find it embarrassing and pretend to understand). This is a real problem when they are working with clients.

I recently gave birth and the team delivering my baby seemed to have difficulty in understanding each other due to the strong accents of the two doctors.

AIBU to think that this isn't just me and should be addressed in the work place? Is there a way to tackle this without just sounding racist?

I'm Glaswegian but fairly well spoken and i find a lot of Southern English people just ask you to repeat yourself on principle. They certainly understand it when told to piss off.

If you really struggle to understand anyone with a different accent to you then you should really think about spreading your social horizons.

I work with a Geordie and she speaks another language most of the time! However, with time and patience I'm almost fluent and understand 95% of what she says now . As long as she doesn't go off on a rant, I'm fine :)

I find it a wee bit insulting that certain scottish television programmes are subtitled however I have never come across any programmes made in England being given the same treatment.

Is there any way of approaching it then?

I think that I was concerned during my birth that in an emergency situation there wouldn't be time for people to repeat themselves 3 or 4 times to be understood.

i dont think there is a way round it, surely medical staff are chosen because they are the most qualified to deal with a situation like that, rather than how they speak? It's unfortunate that it might take a bit longer, but another set of staff who spoke Queen's English might not have been able to deal with your situation at all.

also had that problem with consultant and the nurse had to help translate. Didn't help that I was trying to get him to understand I had ripped muscles while doing the splits and nurse and I to demonstrate what splits was. I also had that problem moving to the South with my strong, fast regional accent - no one understood me and I had to slow down and annunciate clearer but do think folk in the south can be a bit lazy and condescending with accents.

If it's important that you understand, you could ask for the salient points to be written down so that you can remember them.
I agree that communication is key, and that it helps if the person speaking speaks slowly, clearly and facing the person they are talking to. So I'd ask them to do that as well.

I agree with onceamai here.
When about to give birth in hospital, you are probably at your most vulnerable point, and hanging on every word your doctor or midwife says - I know I was, I'd never given birth before.

The last thing you want to do is concentrate hard on someone's speech by making eye-contact with them, lipreading etc.

One of the consultants who came in to see me during delivery spoke very quickly in a non-British accent, barely pausing between breaths, and not really in proper sentences. I did say "I'm sorry, could you say that bit again please?" but she just repeated it all again in the same way and I was none the wiser, about what was actually happening TO ME.

This is is no way the same as dealing with a client in a business situation where you would probably be more lucid anyway, and time wouldn't be so pressing.

I'm afraid I don't see a solution though, without the issue of racism coming up.

I completely agree with validquestion - incidents involving emergencies and healthcare require clear and instantaneous communication and understanding. Lack of either is dangerous.

Jenny I don't mind so much if I can't understand them, but if they can't understand each other in a clinical setting?

I do appreciate that the most skilled people have been given the jobs and they are better than having unskilled people or a vacancy, but is this an issue that people duck because it might appear rasist or because there is no solution? Is there any training that might help? Or is it just plain rude to say "your accent is difficult to understand and we would like you to change it" even if it could be fixed?

In any setting wouldn't you rather hear "there is an issue with your accent and we can arrange some additional training for you to help you to be more easily understood" than to never know that your career is being held back or performance undermined by people too afraid to mention it to you?

Well, my point is it's hard to pinpoint exactly where an accent is difficult to understand and where the listener is reluctant to understand, so if we always assume that the fault is on the part of the 'difficult' accented person then it sets a bar that the standard e.g. Queens English accented person is correct. Which is a bit racist, actually.

My mother had a very strong Geordie accent, and when she trained as a shorthand teacher (involving dictation, and shorthand is written phonetically) she had to have elocution lessons.

andthenthereweretwo -I have seen cockney,chav and streetspeak subtitled on TV.

When you are in hospital and the HCP treating you is hard to understand there is certainly no "reluctance to understand", you want desperately to understand.

And when you smile and nod out of politeness, after asking for repetitions and still don't understand, then it is partly for fear of offending and appearing racist.

And when many people find the same issue with a person with a strong accent, then surely something should be said or done to improve the situation.

as I said, I had to not change my accent but slow down, pronounce words clearer and drop the colloquial slang I had grown up with. It's not unreasonable to do so though sometimes I have resorted to speaking like the queen to get myself understood, especially on the phone!

You mentioned two doctors, OP. Non-EU ones have to pass a language test, part of which is listening to a variety of accents, part of which is speaking etc. have a look on the GMC website for PLAB requirements. The minimum marks have just gone up too. If they were from EU countries this requirement isn't there AFAIK, so you're stuck with a strong German or polish or whatever accent. Not the end of the world I'd have thought, in this day and age of travel etc people are more exposed to other accents.

I am surprised this is seen as racist - unless there are certain strong accents being referred to, and certain other (equally strong) accents not seen as problematic! Which I'm sure is not the case - this is about simple intelligibility.

Surely what everyone has to do is be brave (like ShowofStumps's mum) and just say "I'm sorry, please repeat that more slowly" however many times as is necessary - the more people who say that, the more (surely) the person with the accent will realise that they need to adapt to make themselves understood. (Accents are not fixed - I know, for instance, that my French accent gets better the more I use my French with French people (and obviously the more I put a bit of effort into getting the accent right) - you don't start off with a second-language accent which you cannot lose (or at least soften), that would be a silly view.)

Ok, they have to pass a test - so why are they still not comprehensible? Perhaps they meet this minimum standard, but is it wrong to ask that they are trained in some way to get better than that?

I have difficulty understanding one of the gps in our surgery, if i don't understand i ask him to repeat it but he gets very annoyed. I am not leaving with medical advice i dont understand especially about my medication or my children's health. I tend to ask to see the other gp who also has a strong accent but that i can generally understand or who will happily repeat if i don't. My problem is also related to hearing as i have bad hearing in one ear which make it harder to pick things up in am unfamiliar accent ( doctor knows this)

I don't know how the GMC established what the minimum standard is for PLAB tests, but I know that as of july this year this has gone up, perhaps because it wasn't good enough.

I don't know what training you mean, losing one's accent is a very long and expensive process, not something you manage in a weekend crash course.

I know what you mean though. SOme people are easier to understand than others. That is just a fact.

It's not only non-white people who speak english as their second language and therefore have accents. It's the accent not their colour which makes them hard ot understand.

I can't understand people from parts of NI and I have relatives there!

If the test standard has been raised the there are probably many doctors here already who wouldn't pass the higher bar. Is anything being done to identify and help them? It isn't a case of losing an accent, just identifying a few sounds which are causing trouble and changing those ones.

It would probably be harder to raise this issue with a first language English speaker than second language one I think.

It's all got a bit Alan Partridge

Would this programme of assimilate accents be region-specific?

So an Eton -educated surgeon who speaks the Queen's English will have to speak in a Geordie Accent should he want to work in Newcastle?

What of the travelling consultant? Would they have to have a range of accents they can call upon depending on which hospital they were at?

Or shall we just eradicate regional accents?

It's beginning to remind me of sketch...