Hablas espanol? For future doctors it's a critical, but endangered, skill

I just took a month-long medical Spanish class in preparation for two months of clinical work in rural Latin America. Each day, we would practice our grammar and vocabulary by questioning our professor-turned-Spanish-speaking patient with, say, belly pain. We’d spend an hour every afternoon chatting with a native speaker about everything from body parts to baking recipes.

And during a celebration at the end of the class, we watched "La Cubana," one of our feisty 84-year-old conversation partners, fling off her oversized floral button-down and show us her dance moves to Daddy Yankee -- cultural education at its best.

The course was a refreshing departure from our clinical electives, not only because we were using a different part of our brains but also because we were sharpening a skill that will serve us immensely when we return to the wards, both in the United States and in Guatemala (where I’m headed). In third- and fourth-year rotations, I’ve seen how the ability to connect with a patient on the level of language and culture can be just as clinically useful as a stethoscope or a reflex hammer. The fourth-year course I took has facilitated this interaction, to glowing reviews, since 1971.