Video transcript

Maryam (mother of Melika, 16 months): I know of people who have used interpreters, and it has helped them a lot during the whole pregnancy and birth. I think you can access them, most health care services, especially community ones, and most hospitals provide interpreters and also lots of GPs do as well. So they either call an interpreter or they book an outside one, and they can be really helpful because then you would know, you could be sure that you’ve understood everything fully.

Yasna Meldrum (midwife, counsellor): Interpreters are important because often the medical language can be very, very difficult to understand and where possible we try not to use families as interpreters. Families are great and they do sometimes need to take on that interpreter role, but where possible we try and get a qualified interpreter for them, so that we know they get a good understanding of what they need to know and that we’re actually understanding what they’re telling us as well.