LAS VEGAS (KTNV) — Bilingual students at Pima Medical Institute in Las Vegas say speaking Spanish is more than a personal skill — it's a tool they hope will help them build trust with future patients and families.
Kate Barraza, a pharmacy technician student at the institute, said her path into healthcare started at home, helping her parents manage their diabetes and wondering how their medications worked.
"It's something that I was thinking of through high school. My mom and my dad as well are type 2 diabetics," Barraza said.
WATCH | Bilingual students at Pima Medical Institute prepare to bridge language gaps in healthcare
Barraza said being bilingual could help her do more than fill prescriptions — it could help patients feel understood.
"Coming from my mom that she doesn't know any English at all, and she's always looking for someone who knows Spanish and she just feels more comfortable," Barraza said.
Abigail Ochoa is studying respiratory therapy with plans to work with children. She said bilingualism opens doors in the healthcare field.
"Being bilingual does open a lot of opportunities for us as well. And it's important to be able to communicate that with everyone else," Ochoa said.
The latest publicly available enrollment data shows the institute has 678 students, with about 40 percent identifying as Hispanic or Latino.
Campus president Dr. Lisa Owens said bilingual students bring something both employers and patients are looking for.
"It's very important that they see someone that they can recognize and be comfortable with… that's the importance of making sure that we're connecting the right student with the right clinical site," Owens said.
For Barraza, that connection is personal — and she hopes it follows her from the classroom into the pharmacy.
"If they have any questions or anything like that they can come up to me and trust me and help them out," Barraza said.
For many of these students, the goal isn't just learning a healthcare profession — it's helping patients feel heard when they need it most.
