Congratulations to HELI 2018 Alumna Dr. Maichou Lor!
Maichou Lor, PhD, RN, has received a K23 award from the National Institute for Nursing Research for her project, “Information Visualization to Improve Pain Communication Between Providers, Interpreters, and Patients with Limited English Proficiency.”
Dr. Lor’s project addresses communication challenges between patients, interpreters, and providers that contribute to health disparities, especially for U.S. populations with limited English proficiency (LEP; defined as being unable to read, write, or speak English), in the context of pain. Currently, no patient-interpreter-provider pain communication interventions exist to address LEP patient culture and language barriers in pain reporting. Therefore, the purpose of Dr. Lor’s K23 project is to modify and conduct a pilot test of a tailored pain assessment information visualization (InfoViz) tool to facilitate patient-interpreter-provider triad communication of pain severity, location, and quality to increase mutual understanding (MU) during pain assessment. LEP Hmong will be the focus of this study because pain is particularly problematic for this group; they describe pain using visual metaphors that are inconsistent with providers’ knowledge and interpreters struggle to translate metaphors accurately between patients and providers.
Dr. Lor’s career goal is to establish an independent patient-oriented research program that focuses on designing, implementing, and testing InfoViz tools to improve symptom communication among LEP patients, interpreters, and providers, with the goal of ultimately improving quality of life and reducing health disparities.
Dr. Lor participated in a Mock Grant review during her time at HELI 2018 and while that project was not related to this K23, she says the experience and feedback she gained at HELI helped to guide her writing for this award.
Dr. Lor is an Assistant Professor in the UW-Madison School of Nursing.
Congrats again!
Health Equity Leadership Institute 