Qualitative mental health research using interpreters: a systematic review

Background/Objectives: International migration is increasing, immigrant and ethnic minority communities are expanding, and a growing number of languages are represented in the majority of countries in the European Union. Germany, France, Spain, and the UK are all in the top ten countries in the world with the largest number of international migrants. Between 1995 and 2008, the percentage of the population made up by international migrants increased in Spain, Italy, Greece, Finland, Norway, Austria, and the UK. In 2008, 3.8 million immigrants aged 16 and over lived in the UK. In that year, 590,000 immigrants arrived in the UK and approximately 11% of residents in the UK were from another country of origin.

This population requires appropriate health services. Research and health services must identify the perspectives and needs of a cross-cultural and multilingual population, and be representative both in terms of language and culture. This study aims to: (1) review existing literature on methods for conducting cross-language qualitative research; (2) utilise recommendations from the literature to update criteria for rating quality of cross-language qualitative research; and (3) conduct a systematic review of cross-language qualitative mental health research to assess the quality of the methodology when using interpreters.

Methods: A literature review on methods for cross-language qualitative research was conducted utilising the databases PubMed, PsychINFO, EMBASE, Sociological Abstracts, and JSTOR. The articles yielded in this review will be synthesised to update existing guidelines for conducting qualitative research using interpreters. This will be done in order to acknowledge new research in this area and to update criteria for rating the quality of cross-language qualitative research. A systematic review of qualitative mental health research using interpreters will be conducted using the databases PubMed, PsychINFO, EMBASE, Sociological Abstracts, and JSTOR, and cross-referencing bibliografies from resulting articles. All included studies will be rated for quality utilising the criteria developed from the methodological guidelines.

Results: The literature review yielded articles providing methodological recommendations for achieving trustworthiness in cross-language qualitative research, including literature reviews and discussion papers. This evidence will be used to develop methodological guidelines for conducting qualitative mental health research using interpreters and criteria for rating quality. These criteria will be used to assess the quality and trustworthiness of existing qualitative mental health research using interpreters. The criteria, the results of the systematic review, and the assessment of the qualitative mental health research using interpreters will be presented.

Discussion/Conclusions: Further development of criteria to rate the quality of cross-language qualitative research will provide a method for assessing qualitative research using interpreters and allow the trustworthiness of research identified through the systematic review to be assessed. It is hoped that this will lead to more robust cross-language studies and further our knowledge of the mental health needs of migrant populations.

Funding: NIHR BRC PhD studentship Stakeholder Participation theme, Overseas Research Scholarship Award, King's International Graduate Scholarship.

Keywords: Knowledge transfer, interpreter, qualitative research.