Why do you hate video remote interpreting (vri)????

I would love to have a live terp. My doctors and nurses had to make turns to talk to a mic. It took longer than expected. I doubt wearing multiple wireless mics with clippers might solve the problem if the noise in the background is blocked in any way.

Deaf people with visual problems may have trouble seeing the screen at a distance. The screen size is almost similar to tablet. That would be one of the major concerns.
 
Barbaro said:
Deaf people with visual problems may have trouble seeing the screen at a distance. The screen size is almost similar to tablet. That would be one of the major concerns.
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Good point. I definitely would have trouble seeing a VRI screen without my glasses and seeing the interpreter sign even up close on a screen. Live interpreter would be better (close interpreting). I haven't had that experience yet...despite the fact I've had many surgeries in the last 20-25 years (including one ER visit- that was fun trying to sign to the owner of the dog that bit me...on both arms).
 
It sucks dic@.. Too slow and buggy. Freezes mostly. Pass.
 
DeafDucky said:
Good point. I definitely would have trouble seeing a VRI screen without my glasses and seeing the interpreter sign even up close on a screen. Live interpreter would be better (close interpreting). I haven't had that experience yet...despite the fact I've had many surgeries in the last 20-25 years (including one ER visit- that was fun trying to sign to the owner of the dog that bit me...on both arms).
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I wear glasses, too. When a nurse left me alone with VRI, I decided to remove my glasses to see an interpreter on the screen. Sadly, all I saw is blurry. Anyway, I removed my hearing aids and changed my clothes to gown before I was put on the bed. They let me keep my glasses for communication. I was worried they might lose my glasses after I came out of the surgery room. I had to lend my glasses to one of the nurses and she put it in my personal bag. They moved VRI to my surgery room. They knew I couldn't see, so they had to move VRI closer to my face. It didn't work. I couldn't tell them because they gave me sedative. Ha.

I am sorry that dog bit you. What happened? How many stitches did you get from dog bite?
 
Barbaro said:
I am sorry that dog bit you. What happened? How many stitches did you get from dog bite?
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It was a Chow Chow (I now do not like/am afraid of them)- I was babysitting him for a friend of mine while she and her family were moving. She SAID she would visit every day (week long move) but they only made it for the first 2 or 3 days. After that the dog I think just plain got confused and stressed- he was 2 so one night he kind of snapped and jumped on me and bit down on left arm...tried to get him off (stupidly tried to open his jaw- thus why I have a small scar on middle right finger on palm side)...let go and as I was closing the bathroom door (to keep him in there) he lunged for the right arm...

Had to have surgery to clean it all up as the left one was a gaping wound (ew). They used big stitches- I can't remember how many total on all the wounds as some were from his claws (nails?) too. Ended up in hospital for 4 or 5 days and out of work for 5 weeks (I was working as a case manager with Intellectually Disabled kids/adults with behavior issues so lots of physical contact).

Left is 3 inches long, right one is about one to two inches- never measured that one.

*the bathroom wasn't a typical bathroom- it was a long and sort of narrow room in an old Victorian home so yep enough room to shut him in there. Poor aunt freaked when she saw me- and promptly took HER dog with us driving to the hospital.
 
DeafDucky said:
It was a Chow Chow (I now do not like/am afraid of them)- I was babysitting him for a friend of mine while she and her family were moving. She SAID she would visit every day (week long move) but they only made it for the first 2 or 3 days. After that the dog I think just plain got confused and stressed- he was 2 so one night he kind of snapped and jumped on me and bit down on left arm...tried to get him off (stupidly tried to open his jaw- thus why I have a small scar on middle right finger on palm side)...let go and as I was closing the bathroom door (to keep him in there) he lunged for the right arm...

Had to have surgery to clean it all up as the left one was a gaping wound (ew). They used big stitches- I can't remember how many total on all the wounds as some were from his claws (nails?) too. Ended up in hospital for 4 or 5 days and out of work for 5 weeks (I was working as a case manager with Intellectually Disabled kids/adults with behavior issues so lots of physical contact).

Left is 3 inches long, right one is about one to two inches- never measured that one.

*the bathroom wasn't a typical bathroom- it was a long and sort of narrow room in an old Victorian home so yep enough room to shut him in there. Poor aunt freaked when she saw me- and promptly took HER dog with us driving to the hospital.
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That is one of the reasons I won't own a Chow Chow. They're beautiful, but they're erratic. We are not exactly compatible. What a bad ordeal you had to go through! Sorry to hear that. I cannot believe she took her dog with you on the way to the hospital.
 
Barbaro said:
That is one of the reasons I won't own a Chow Chow. They're beautiful, but they're erratic. We are not exactly compatible. What a bad ordeal you had to go through! Sorry to hear that. I cannot believe she took her dog with you on the way to the hospital.
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The dog that went along for the ride was a faux poodle (part poodle part something else- we don't know what lol). The poodle- Ollie hated the Chow. Tonta (my aunt) was afraid that the Chow would come bounding down the stairs and attack poor Ollie.

Yes after that happened, the owner of the Chow did some reading.. found out that Chows were once bred as attack/guard dogs for Chinese royalty. And trained to attack for the jugular vein (how true that is I don't know). But - yes.. they're erratic- many vets/kennels won't board them and many apartments won't allow them.

What drove me nuts and baffled me though was that my friend KEPT the dog anyway- with 3 girls all under the age of 5 in the house. They probably kept him outside tied up to a tree half the time (my one visit to their house he was).
 
DeafDucky said:
The dog that went along for the ride was a faux poodle (part poodle part something else- we don't know what lol). The poodle- Ollie hated the Chow. Tonta (my aunt) was afraid that the Chow would come bounding down the stairs and attack poor Ollie.

Yes after that happened, the owner of the Chow did some reading.. found out that Chows were once bred as attack/guard dogs for Chinese royalty. And trained to attack for the jugular vein (how true that is I don't know). But - yes.. they're erratic- many vets/kennels won't board them and many apartments won't allow them.

What drove me nuts and baffled me though was that my friend KEPT the dog anyway- with 3 girls all under the age of 5 in the house. They probably kept him outside tied up to a tree half the time (my one visit to their house he was).
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I don't blame vets and kennels. Chow Chows are hyperactive, so they require exercise. My cousins used to have Chow Chow, and she was so wild and barked at other dog like crazy. They had to break them up frequently. My cousins had to give away other dog immediately, so Chow Chow would not become aggressive. They worked so hard to train her, and she was doing a lot better. She became a territorial when it come to other dog invading her space.

Poodle? I prefer large standard poodle over small toy poodles. They're guard dogs, too. My grandmother used to have toy poodles over the years, and they drove me nuts. They bark at anyone who knocks on the door and hiss at them. If I gave Grandma a hug, her poodle hissed at me every time. Standard poodle are more mellow than toy poodle. I cannot stand toy poodles.
 
Barbaro said:
Poodle? I prefer large standard poodle over small toy poodles. They're guard dogs, too. My grandmother used to have toy poodles over the years, and they drove me nuts. They bark at anyone who knocks on the door and hiss at them. If I gave Grandma a hug, her poodle hissed at me every time. Standard poodle are more mellow than toy poodle. I cannot stand toy poodles.
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I think he looked closer to standard. mellowest dog on the face of the earth lol. His life was a bit rough his first year. Aunt rescued him after he was hit by a car (why his tail never looked right). He was particular about who he snuggled up to too lol. Yeah he barked at the door a lot but never hissed.

And you are correct... Chows are territorial and tend to be "one person" dogs- probably part of the reason why he went bonkers- missed his owners.

PS apologies for derailing the thread!
 
Simple answers: choppy video quality due to poor video speed. Some Deaf patients lay flat and are not able to see VRI. VRI is not the best for some Deaf blind patients either. Bulk machines are not able to fit into a tiny surgery room where a surgeon with many other techicians around. Overall, it is not the best solution for various reasons.

My friend is working at a hospital as a health care administrator and asked her Deaf buddies for information before giving a presentation to all doctors, nurses, and ER staff about VRI issues. Doctors, nurses, and ER staff agreed that they were struggled to make VRI work. Then, she asked upper people to order ipads for next fiscal year. Best solution is getting ipads for hospitals because I have seen many, many, many, I stressed you, many doctors and nurses using iphones and/or ipads in the hospitals. Plus they should enhance quality internet speed, too.
 
Oddball, Thanks for the feedback. I agree that network speeds at the hospital are a big issue. If hospitals would spin-up a dedicated network for these services, it would go much better for them. But since I can't control what network the hospital uses, the only thing I can do is make sure my solution will work with networks that are experiencing heavy traffic.
 
Yeah, talking about choppy video... there's a woman in bed just completed the surgery and her husband standing by her. The Dr explain to woman in bed while she watched the VRI that Dr said, "You have STD" and she got all upset and wanted to divorce her husband....
In the video.. signing "do not" was chopped out......
 
gtanner said:
Oddball, Thanks for the feedback. I agree that network speeds at the hospital are a big issue. If hospitals would spin-up a dedicated network for these services, it would go much better for them. But since I can't control what network the hospital uses, the only thing I can do is make sure my solution will work with networks that are experiencing heavy traffic.
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gtanner, what would hospitals getting dedicated networks entail? Would it be cost prohibitive?
 
SneakerNet said:
Yeah, talking about choppy video... there's a woman in bed just completed the surgery and her husband standing by her. The Dr explain to woman in bed while she watched the VRI that Dr said, "You have STD" and she got all upset and wanted to divorce her husband....
In the video.. signing "do not" was chopped out......
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My god. I feel bad for them. Misunderstanding is another issue relating to VRI. Shit.
 
Tousi said:
gtanner, what would hospitals getting dedicated networks entail? Would it be cost prohibitive?
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There are two issues that the hospital needs to address. The bandwidth limitations of their internal network and the internet service to their network.

Networks
Most hospitals have a dedicated network that is used by the staff...and a separate network that is designated as "Guest". The issue is that most hospitals use the guest network for their VRI connection. This results in inconsistent bandwidth. A call placed on Monday when their is minimal traffic on the Guest network is crystal clear, A call placed on Tuesday when the Guest network has a lot of traffic is choppy and dithers. So if the issues is that the network being used has to much traffic on it, then creating a dedicated network for VRI is simple. The hospital would create another password protected network and label it as VRI or Interpreting. There is no cost to the hospital for equipment, just the time spent by the IT person creating the new network. Our experience is that 70% of the time we do a tech support call for one of our hospitals , the issue is with traffic on the network the hospital is using for VRI.

The Internet Connection
This is were the Hospital needs to do some investigating. The hospital can create multiple networks, but all these networks share the same internet connection. So if the issue is not "to much traffic on the network", then it's most likely the internet connection speed to the hospital.

There are options like MPLS connections that a hospital can use that provide a dedicate amount of bandwidth to a specific application. These services cost a few thousand dollars a year, but that is a lot less than the Hospital will spend defending itself from a law suite for poor service.

I know companies hate added costs, but if your going to go through the time and expense to provide VRI service (presumably in an effort to save money by not using on-site interpreting), then go all the way and make sure that VRI service has a dedicated connection to the internet.
 
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Oddball said:
My god. I feel bad for them. Misunderstanding is another issue relating to VRI. Shit.
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OH it's not a real story but it's similar. One HOH person thought she understood her Dr and she was upset then few months later she still complaining with her issue and her dr figure out what was the issue and she thought she got STD, the Dr took aback and look at record quickly and told her no she Doesn't have STD!! So..she thought the dr told her that she have STD....but she missed two words. I know she's married and I'm not going to ask her if she was angry with her husband or whatever. I told her she really need to have interpreter. She thought she could understood her Dr well. Mmmmm..... look at what happen.... It made me think about VRI, that some words cut off to make it sound like a horrible news, I mean few words missing turning into disaster. What Dr saying to the VRI is positive news but coming out of VRI to a deaf person a very bad news....You know??
 
Hm Interesting about the network and internet and how that plays in to the clarity of the video. I see that problem with my Z70 right now. it's still somewhat choppy when I use it for VRS (haven't had much use for peer to peer as I'm not a "phone" person no matter what kind of phone it is!). Even power cycled the modem and router.. solved it for a short while but it's creeping back.

Almost like it's because of a bottleneck at the router (there are three direct wired devices into it- 1 Mac, 1 PC and the VP).
 
DeafDucky said:
Hm Interesting about the network and internet and how that plays in to the clarity of the video. I see that problem with my Z70 right now. it's still somewhat choppy when I use it for VRS (haven't had much use for peer to peer as I'm not a "phone" person no matter what kind of phone it is!). Even power cycled the modem and router.. solved it for a short while but it's creeping back.

Almost like it's because of a bottleneck at the router (there are three direct wired devices into it- 1 Mac, 1 PC and the VP).
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I would be happy to give you a coy of our ACCESS software that you could use to see if it improves your video qulaity while on a VRS call. The software would also let you do Video Phone calls, Text relay calls, IP TTY calls and TTY calls. let me know if that is of interest to you. If nothing else, it would be a good test to see if the problem lies with the network/internet speed or the Z70.
 
gtanner said:
I would be happy to give you a coy of our ACCESS software that you could use to see if it improves your video qulaity while on a VRS call. The software would also let you do Video Phone calls, Text relay calls, IP TTY calls and TTY calls. let me know if that is of interest to you. If nothing else, it would be a good test to see if the problem lies with the network/internet speed or the Z70.
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Hmm not a bad thought but would it work with the standalone Z70 device? I do have the Z5 app on my PC as well (along with Sorenson, deleted Purple and Convo).
 
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