Cross-cultural communication （10）　

10）From my experience of working at the American Hospital of Paris
　 At the American Hospital of Paris, I was mainly involved in the treatment of Japanese patients living in Paris. So in terms of communication with patients, there was no cross-cultural element. However, many of the patients were mentally distressed because they were being exposed to the different culture of France in their daily lives. The biggest factor in raising the cross-cultural barrier is that Japanese people are not good at French, and French people are not good at foreign languages, including English. However, for Japanese people who think of foreigners as friendly and gullible Americans, the fact that they are often confused when they come into contact with the opposite of this, the French (especially Parisians), is also a major factor in causing cross-cultural problems. From this, we must also graduate from the idea of Europe and America as a single entity.

　Although there are only a few, there have been times when non-Japanese patients have visited my outpatient clinic. There have been several times when Asian tourists who wanted to receive medical treatment in English have requested to be treated by me, as I am Asian. There have also been times when the family of a French patient who could only speak French visited my outpatient clinic. This patient was in the final stages of cancer and had been declared to be no longer a candidate for standard anti-cancer therapy. The patient and his family had obtained information about cancer immunotherapy in Japan and came to consult me about whether or not this therapy was possible at my outpatient clinic. Unfortunately, I was unable to perform the therapy in France as it was not approved there, but I was able to explain this satisfactorily.

　These communications with French patients went unexpectedly well. My explanations in French with limited vocabulary were accepted without any major complaints. I thought that satisfactory communication was possible with poor language ability, if the aim of the communication was simple and clear.

　After returning to Japan from France, I started attending Alliance Francaise, a French language school again. At a party of Alliance, a woman who was a professional French interpreter with much better French skills than me told me her true feelings: “No matter how good your French is, you will always lose out to someone like Kido-san, who has so much to give as a doctor. I wanted to become a doctor or lawyer and then master French.” She certainly has a point.

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