More than 27 million people in the United States communicate most comfortably in a language other than English, based on U.S. Census data. When patients seek medical care, the gap between what a clinician says and what a patient understands can have serious consequences. A 2025 paper in the Joint Commission Journal on Quality and Patient Safety showed that patients with language barriers face a greater risk of adverse events, including medication errors, longer hospital stays and delayed treatment.

Interpreter services and translated materials have long been standard practice in health systems, but digital care delivery has outpaced the infrastructure that supports it. That’s why the gap between language support and equitable care remains stubbornly wide. Closing it requires a more integrated approach of three key elements.

Translation: the first line of communication

Language access in health systems has traditionally followed two routes: interpreter services and telephone translation. Each comes with limitations. In-person interpreters are expensive, and availability is inconsistent, particularly for unplanned encounters. Phone interpreter services are more accessible, but usually aren’t suited to the volume and variety of multilingual interactions a busy health system encounters on any given day.

In many health systems, point-of-care translation still depends on a shared tablet mounted to a wheeled pole. When a clinician needs one, it may not be charged, or it may already be in use. Because tracking one down takes time most clinical encounters can’t spare, those devices often go untouched when they’re needed. Furthermore, tablet-based solutions support only live video interpretation, leaving gaps for audio-only encounters and situations that require a faster, more flexible exchange.

AI-powered translation tools installed directly on clinical mobile devices have begun to address what past approaches couldn’t quite cover. The technology has advanced to the point where a clinician’s device can facilitate real-time conversation across hundreds of languages and dialects without any third-party involvement. When a conversation requires deeper linguistic support, capable platforms may escalate to an on-demand live interpreter. For encounters involving patients or family members with different language needs in the same setting, one-to-many translation handles what a single interpreter cannot. 

Security: patient data and regulatory compliance

Clinicians today are delivering care across settings that a traditional hospital IT framework was never designed to support. Care happens in patients’ homes, in neighborhood clinics and on personal devices after hours, and every one of those interactions is subject to the same healthcare industry regulatory requirements as anything that happens inside the hospital.

Mobile devices deployed in clinical workflows without proper governance can create exposure that health systems may not discover until something goes wrong. It also raises critical questions about data management: Who controls software updates across a distributed device fleet? How is patient data handled when a personal phone is used for clinical work? How does an organization maintain visibility and control over devices it doesn’t fully manage? These questions determine whether a mobile health initiative delivers on its promise or creates new liability.

Hardware-level security provides credible answers to those questions. The right mobile management infrastructure keeps patient data protected across a distributed workforce, provides IT teams with centralized oversight of every device in the field and maintains a clean separation between personal and clinical data, so regulatory obligations don’t erode the moment a clinician steps outside the hospital. With that foundation in place, health systems can confidently deploy AI-driven translation solutions that meet clinical-grade regulatory requirements and are built for medical terminology accuracy.

How translation data gets processed is as important as the translation itself. Mobile AI that handles language conversion on the device, rather than routing conversation data through external servers, keeps patient interactions entirely off third-party infrastructure. For organizations managing regulatory obligations as they scale language access into community settings, that architecture is one to understand before deployment, not after.

Trust: what technology can’t replace

Translation tools can work flawlessly, and a device can be fully secured, yet a patient may still choose not to engage. For millions of Americans with basic English skills, the decision to seek care, follow through on a referral or trust a discharge plan is informed by what they and their families have experienced in healthcare settings.

Part of the hesitation stems from confidence in the conversation itself. Patients who aren’t confident that the exchange is working tend to disengage quietly, going through the motions of a visit without ever feeling heard or certain they understood correctly.

When language access tools work well, they make the exchange visible to both parties. A patient who can see their own words rendered accurately on screen and follow what the clinician is saying in real time gains confidence that the conversation is productive. When patients trust the conversation, they participate in it more fully, and that participation helps drive better outcomes. That’s where language access technology, when deployed thoughtfully, has the potential to change not just the conversation but the outcome.

Framework for the future

Translation, security and trust are interdependent. A health system with strong translation tools but weak security may create compliance exposure. One with a strong security infrastructure but poor patient-facing communication tools ends up in a vacuum. One that prioritizes communication tools without the security infrastructure to support them creates compliance risk.

Getting all three right takes deliberate effort and cross-functional commitment. For the patients who need it most, that investment pays off and can lead to the positive health outcomes that define leading health systems.

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