Table 4.
Percent of California Physicians That Self-reported Fluency in Selected Languages by Specialty (Primary Care Versus Non-primary Care) and Medical School of Graduation (USMG Versus IMG)
| Physician Specialty | Fluency in Language | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Spanish (%) |
Chinese Language† (%) |
Southeast Asian Language‡ (%) |
Pacific Islander Language§ (%) |
Korean Language (%) |
||||||
| Non-Primary Care (n=36,591) |
15.5 | 5.3 | 1.8 | 2.0 | 1.7 | |||||
| USMG | 14.9 | P<.001 | 4.1 | P<.001 | 1.5 | P<.001 | 0.5 | P<.001 | 1.1 | P<.001 |
| IMG | 17.8 | 10.1 | 2.8 | 7.6 | 4.1 | |||||
| Primary Care (n=18,483) |
23.5 | 7.2 | 3.6 | 4.7 | 1.8 | |||||
| USMG | 23.4 | P=.48 | 6.0 | P<.001 | 2.6 | P<.001 | 1.0 | P<.001 | 1.3 | P<.001 |
| IMG | 23.9 | 10.1 | 5.7 | 13.2 | 2.9 | |||||
Foreign Language: =Mandarin, Cantonese, and other Chinese languages;
=Hmong, Lao, Mien, Thai, Vietnamese, and Cambodian;
=Samoan, Tagalog, and Ilocano. Primary Care Specialties = family medicine, general internal medicine, and general pediatrics.
Note: All P values calculated using χ2 tests. For all language categories, primary care physicians were more likely (P<.05) than physicians in non-primary care specialties to self-report fluency in the corresponding language.
USMG—US medical graduate
IMG—international medical graduate.
Medical school graduated was used to classify physicians as USMG or IMG.