The most significant barrier AAPIs experience in accessing long term services and supports is limited English proficiency, or LEP. LEP individuals are those who do not speak English as their primary language, and who have a limited ability to read, write, speak or understand English.
There are mandatory state and federal requirements to ensure language access for LEP Americans. For example, Title VI of the Civil Rights Act provides guidance to address this issue. In order to ensure compliance with Title VI, recipients of Federal financial assistance (such as funding through the Older American’s Act) must take steps to ensure that LEP persons who are eligible for their programs or services have “meaningful access to the health and social service benefits” that they provide.
At an organizational level, ensuring language access can be challenging. For this reason, the National Resource Center on AAPI Aging developed this fact sheet to identify resources and strategies that organizations can utilize to identify interpreters for LEP AAPI older adults and caregivers.