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In an increasingly multicultural and cosmopolitan society, optometrists are often called upon to perform eye examinations on patients who do not speak English. All too often, what should be a simple enjoyable interaction between a patient and practitioner can be a source of stress and anguish for both parties, purely because we cannot communicate in a common language. While all of us, I'm sure, have managed to conduct an examination with the use of gestures, pointing and facial expressions, how much easier would it be if we could instruct our patients with a few phrases in their own language.
This series of short articles, therefore, sets out to equip the practitioner with some basic language phrases for use in an eye examination. The European languages will be written in their native form and phonetically, while languages of the middle east and far east will only be presented phonetically, so that you can pronounce the words as they are written.
Ironically, unless you intend to study and become fluent in the language, it would be self-defeating to speak too authentically, since you may not then be able to understand the reply you receive. Consequently, this is a very basic set of phrases and vocabulary, and should still be heavily supplemented with your usual sign language and charming smile.
I hope that these phrases will be of use to optometrists, dispensing opticians, contact lens fitters and support staff alike and will go some way to putting your patients at ease and improve the accuracy of your subjective tests. Start with a few phrases, and as your confidence grows you can pick up on the more complex sentences, and even start making up a few of your own.
FRENCH
French is the mother tongue for about 87 million people. As a first language it is spoken in western Europe (France, Belgium, Switzerland, Luxembourg and Monaco), Western and Central Africa, and Canada. French is also the official language in 29 countries.
The French always seem to master the English language so well, often making the need for the optometrist to speak French redundant. However, in the last three months alone, I have examined two patients who only spoke French, even though one was an eight year-old child whom I'm sure understood every word I said, but was just too shy to reply.
French is probably the language that we are all the most familiar with from our school days, so I'm sure that this article will act as a refresher course for most of you. For the fluent French speaker do bear in mind this is a basic 'get you by' aide and not an exercise in grammar.
I have written each phrase in French, and then written it phonetically to help you with the pronunciation. Don't be too embarrassed to try each phrase with a little French accent. Please note that in French all nouns are either masculine or feminine. This affects the pronunciation of the preceding word. In order to keep things simple, the following phrases are written predominantly in a masculine format. They should, however, still be understood by your patients.
I hope you enjoy trying some French out, and 'bonne chance'.
? The author would like to give special thanks to Elinor Block for providing the editorial for the French translation.
? KalpanaTheophilus is an optometrist practising in London