Greetings:

Hablamos Juntos is pleased to announce a unique opportunity for health care facilities serving multilingual communities, funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Pioneer Portfolio. In an ongoing partnership with the Society for Environmental and Graphic Design (SEGD), Hablamos Juntos is launching this initiative aimed at encouraging widespread adoption of Universal Health Care symbols by health facilities serving populations unable to read or with limited English proficiency (LEP). The Pioneer Portfolio supports innovative ideas and projects that may lead to important breakthroughs in the future of health and health care.  Please help us get the word out of this unique opportunity by forwarding this email to health facilities that may be interested in symbols based signage. Health facilities ranging from small treatment or health centers, single building health care facilities and facilities part of multi-building campus with advanced preparations for implementing new wayfinding systems are encouraged to apply.

Universally recognized graphic symbols, such as traffic symbols or those used to identify parking spaces for the physically handicapped, can be effective ways of communicating with low literacy and limited English speaking populations. Pictures or images that consistently enable logical associations are what make symbols useful in communicating across languages and cultures. Using a rigorous development and testing process, phase one involved the most comprehensive symbols design effort ever undertaken and produced 28 universal health care symbols.

In this second phase, we are seeking four volunteer health facilities ready to implement new signage or wayfinding systems to innovate using symbol-based signage and to help develop best practices for health environments. The project offers a team of leading national experts in symbols and wayfinding signage to support design and testing of health care facilities signage systems using graphic symbols. Facilities selected will be rewarded with award-winning wayfinding systems using best practice application of symbols as a practical solution in health care signage for multilingual and literacy challenged populations.

The deadline for application is July 1, 2008.  For a copy of the RFA seeking innovator health facilities to implement symbol-based signage click here.

Thank you for your continued interest in the work of Hablamos Juntos and our common effort to promote all patients have access to safe, quality health care, regardless of their preferred language.