Election Results
The election voting period ended yesterday December 17 at 5pm and we are happy to report the new 2009-2011 IMIA Board. Please join us in welcoming them as our new board and let's wish them much success in leading the IMIA in the next two years! Their term starts officially after the new Year, according to our Bylaws.
President
Izabel Arocha, M.Ed.
First and foremost I am a medical interpreter since the early 90s. As one who interprets also at other venues, I see common ground with all my interpreter colleagues. Medical interpreting is a specialization that has not achieved the recognition of court or conference interpreters and I wish to change that. Since 2006 I have been given the honor of working for you as the association's president. My goals were to renew the energy of the organization and take it to a new level, not only as an international organization, but more importantly as a credible and financially responsible and self supporting organization. My goals for the next two years are two-fold: to grow and implement a successful certification program in 2009. I do not seek to repeat what has been done, but to continue to take this organization where it has never been before. These are bold goals but considering the work we have accomplished together, I think it can be done and I count on you to allow me to continue these projects. I believe this is important as I represent the practicing interpreter who practices a noble profession under difficult working conditions. Let's forge ahead in unity.
Vice President
Lourdes "Lulu" Sanchez
I have been involved with the Medical Interpreting profession since 1994. I was trained as a medical Interpreter by my former boss, Margarita Battle one of the founding members of the Meidcal Interpreters Association and one of the participants in the development of the first Standards of Practice for Medical Interpreters. In 1997, I was given the task of leading MGH Interpreter Services in Boston, MA. Since then I worked really hard to raise the bar for Medical Interpreters inside and outside the institution so they could be recognized as professionals and part of the medical team. I have also worked as a consultant with a project in Europe sponsored by the World Health Organization to assist hospitals to provide culturally responsive health and health promotion services for migrant and ethnic minority groups, specifically interventions, address language needs in clinical setting. At the beginning of 2008 I worked with the NYC Health and Hospitals Corporation to evaluate the language services programs they had in plance to be able to develop recommendations to enhance services. Currently I am working as an Administrative Consultant with Boston Medical Center Language Services program. I have been a member of different Advisory Boards to enhance medical interpreters training programs. I am currently a member of the certification committee of the IMIA and the National Colaition on Certification.
Board Directors
Eduardo Tabio
I am the manager of the Language Assistance Program at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York City, a position I've held for more than two years. Prior to that, I interpreted for Spanish-speaking patients full time for three years at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital in Washington Heights, New York. I still interpret at Memorial. I believe from my experience in the field in the past few years that the IMIA is uniquely positioned to represent the best in our profession, nationally and internationally, and I want to be part of that effort. I have a BA in Political Science from Columbia University and a Law Degree from Boston University. Before becoming an interpreter, I practiced law as an international commercial litigator in New York City for more than 15 years. In the next two years, I would work to promote the vision of the IMIA for the medical interpreter profession, and to achieve its stated goals – particularly in the areas of interpreter certification and professional development.
Maria Gatej
It is a great honor for me to be part again of the 2008 IMIA process of elections for a position that I dearly dedicated my last ten years. In this capacity, for the entire past decade I constantly offered my serious commitment in attending and actively participating in our IMIA (MMIA) board meetings and annual conferences. I was also an active member in the IMIA Board's Retreat and planning efforts. One of the many volunteer activities sustained over the years, as a board director was my participation as a member in the IMIA Medical Interpreter Certification Committee. In 2007, together with my distinguished colleagues of the IMIA By-Laws Review Committee, I dedicated all my efforts and legal knowledge for a period of many months in successfully reviewing and editing the new IMIA By-Laws. If elected, it is my goal to continue to offer my experience and my professional commitment to our organization's work. If elected in this position, I'm committed to continue my efforts in recruiting new members and promoting the medical interpreter profession and the IMIA to other organizations. Through this work I will be able to help building collegial working relationship. Moreover, I am determined to continue to serve and accept assignments in my capacity, volunteering in various IMIA projects (similar to the ones in which I was involved all these ten wonderful years!).
Fanny Tchorz
Working in the health care field for several years has enabled me to assist the non-English speaking patients of this community to fully understand their medical care by using qualified medical interpreters. Interpreters must be fully proficient in their designated languages, constantly upgrading their skills with continued education, and vow to carry out the IMIA standards and code of ethics on a daily basis. These principles are all tremendously important during interpretation in order to bridge the language gaps between patients and providers to eliminate language barriers. If given the opportunity, I pledge to continue my work with the IMIA to develop a certification track for all interpreters to affirm competency, to advocate for this community by reaching out to local physicians' practices, to work toward increasing IMIA memberships to promote our profession and to have a more active role in fundraising to secure the future of the IMIA. If elected, I will continue to uphold my duties and obligations not only with the IMIA but also with the community at large.
Cynthia Schenck
I have been an IMIA member in good standing since 1995. I was the manager of interpreter services @ Union Hospital NSMC for five years. After leaving the hospital I started an Interpreter Service Company, Medical Interpreters of the North Shore, with my partner William Schenck. I have been an IMIA Board member for some years. In this position I have raised approximately$65,000.00 dollars for the conferences and the IMIA Certification Project. I have contacted and arranged the Keynote Speakers for the conference such as Peter Angood M.D. Of the Joint Commission and Howard Koh M.D. I have arranged for outstanding M.D.'s to give workshops at the conferences as well as specialty workshops on surgery and healing etc. I am a member of the NCC Steering Committee for the National Coalition on Certification for Health Care Interpreters. I am a guest speaker for a health care professional course at San Jose State University in San Jose California. Among other things my goals for the IMIA are to continue to make this the largest and most successful International Medical Interpreter Association in the world, to see medical interpreter certification become a reality. To see the profession of medical interpreting become a viable and well paid means of support for qualified interpreters and to continue to provide professional employment opportunities and affordable training to medical interpreters.
Patricia Z. Moreno
I am a front-line medical interpreter, educator/trainer, who has promoted our role as professionals for the past eight years to administrators, providers, educators and other interpreters. I have and will continue to promote our work as a profession that merits dignity and respect; which should mirror the dignity and respect given to providers and which our immigrant patients merit. I am hard-working, ethical, and committed. For the past eight years I have been a medical interpreter in New York and am currently a staff interpreter at Memorial Sloan-Kettering. I have been a medical interpreter educator/trainer for six years and am the curriculum developer and lead instructor of the NYU-SCPS medical interpreter certificate program. I have been a community educator/coordinator of immigrant ESL programs; taught Spanish at The New School and am currently a part-time English/Humanities instructor at The City College (CUNY). Previously, I worked in marketing and business development for mid-sized companies. I have a BA in Literary Studies from NYU and an MA in Language and Literacy from The City College (CUNY). In the next two years I would like to dedicate myself to promoting the vision of the IMIA and working towards the implementation of its goals, specifically in the certification process, professional development/education of interpreters; and membership development.
Karin Elliot
I am from the state of Maine, and I am running for the board position of Chair Person for the Education Committee. I believe that members should vote for me for this position based on my professional educational training in interpreting, my 16 years of experience as a simultaneous and consecutive interpreter in a whole host of fields and settings -- from International Space Station engineering to medical interpreting, and because I am currently an Interpreter Trainer for both Basic Interpreting Skills and Medical Interpreting in the state of Maine. I hold an M.A. in Russian Conference Interpretation from the Monterey Institute of International Studies, and an M.A. and B.A. in Russian and East European Studies and Russian Language with distinction from Stanford University. I also speak German. In addition to interpreting and teaching, I translate written materials from Russian into English and German into English. I have studied, lived, worked and traveled throughout the former Soviet Union, Germany, Austria and Switzerland. In the next two years I will strive to increase the quality and expectations of the medical interpreting profession, through promoting excellence in medical interpreting training programs. Thank you for your consideration.
Provider Outreach Committee Chair
Anita Coelho Diabate
We established an advisory committee to include Physicians, Nurses and Nurse Practitioners and formed an allegiance with the American Psychiatric Association to include an invitation to participate in their upcoming annual meeting in San Francisco in May 2009. We created and distributed a survey to providers across the US and Canada, which resulted in invaluable feedback and 77 new IMIA memberships. I am the current Provider Outreach Chair, and have previous experience serving as both Board member and committee Chair in professional organizations where we met and exceeded our objectives. I will work to establish a larger committee, increase public awareness of the IMIA and our mission and to achieve new initiatives and avenues for equal language access for LEP patients. I wish to lead this committee in realizing new initiatives to include CME's and CEU's through education for both Providers and interpreters, further strengthening partnership and outcomes between providers and interpreters, and giving educational credit as an added incentive for participation. To continue to pursue professional alliances with health care associations throughout the country and to broaden IMIA exposure moving forward.
Certification Committee Chair
Oscar Arocha, MM
I have been a member of the IMIA since 1994. Prior to that, I had worked as an independent medical interpreter contractor for several hospitals. For years I was jumping from one institution to another, covering on-call pagers for Spanish, Portuguese and French assignments. I worked as per diem interpreter, later becoming part time, and then full time. Seeing the lack of assessment tolls at the time, I offer to create the first "tests" for two local hospitals in the early 1990's. These were two of the earliest interpreter assessment tools adopted in the Boston area. Since then I have been involved in the creation of 5 more assessment tools, some of which continue to be utilized to assess the skills of medical interpreters today. As medical interpreting continues to grow, I believe this is the time to have a certification process that gives this profession a greater sense of legitimacy. To this end, if elected, I will devote plenty of energy, with a "no non-sense" approach, to ensure that that the IMIA successfully achieves the completion of a fair and effective certification process for medical interpreters.
