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With a minor in Healthcare Sign Language, you'll be able to communicate with patients who might otherwise struggle to find an advocate. By emphasizing compassion through language, you'll break down the communication barriers that can hinder the patient experience. This valuable skill could allow you to stand out to potential employers.
All students seeking a bachelor's degree from Nebraska Methodist College are eligible to take the Healthcare Sign Language minor. Over the course of 18 credit hours and six semesters, you'll learn critical vocabulary that includes some of the most common terms needed to sustain an ongoing dialogue with a Deaf/hard-of-hearing patient. These practical communication skills will allow you to translate important care instructions to the patient and help the patient express his or her needs to their healthcare provider team.
The Sign Language for Healthcare Professionals minor requires COM 245 or COM 262 as a pre-requisite.
COM 262 American Sign Language Basic Skills - 3 credit hours
This course deals with the ASL skills that anyone in healthcare will need to conduct basic communication with people who are deaf. Some study of deaf culture is included.
COM 267 American Sign Language Vocabulary - 3 credit hours
This course builds on students' basic skills in everyday, healthcare-related communication with people who are deaf. Content about deaf culture is included, and this deepens the potential for meaningful interactions.
COM 272 American Sign Language Advanced Vocabulary - 3 credit hours
In this course, students learn vocabulary in American Sign Language that is broader in scope than the vocabulary needed for medical and healthcare interactions, which was learned in COM 262 and COM 267.
COM 362 American Sign Language Linguistics - 3 credit hours
In this course, students will adopt a focus that is both deeper and broader than the focus of prior courses in NMC's Sign Language Minor program. More specific rules of American Sign Language and broader attention to deaf culture will result in even more useful learning.
COM 367 Deaf Culture - 3 credit hours
This course focuses less on expressive and receptive skills in the use of American Sign Language and much more on norms and debates about and within Deaf culture, as well as relevant cultural values and theories.
COM 372 Strategies of Communication & Ethics in Healthcare - 3 credit hours
This hybrid course includes an internship with members of a deaf community; students also study deaf people's rights under the Americans with Disabilities Act and the relevant healthcare resources that are available to people who are deaf.
Students with ASL language experience or college credit in sign language may take a placement test to be placed in the appropriate level in the minor.
