Meeting people who speak a different language is a great way to discover another culture and its history. But when it comes to health issues, language differences may compromise everyone’s safety as clear communication is essential to avoid medical errors. When you’ve just fled your country or found yourself in areas with precarious healthcare, when healthcare structures are barely adapted to receiving patients not speaking the same language, vulnerability only adds to vulnerability. Without interpreters, most healthcare professionals have neither the tools nor the financial resources to better welcome foreign-language patients and provide them with the same standards of care as any other patient. Healthcare systems cope with global crises, other priorities are addressed, and humanitarian actions are often left to associations.

So, when we sat down to think about which missions would be strong enough to thrill us and be useful to society, reducing day-to-day inequalities resulting from language barriers and cultural differences in healthcare was a first mission that seemed obvious to us. That’s how we came to design our first tool, an application that will help everyone, including the most vulnerable to facilitate their interactions with healthcare professionals, and regain the respect and dignity they need in all care situations. And when we came to think how to increase respect and dignity for these people in healthcare, we understood that what would really drive us in the long term is to extend our mission to reducing inequalities in access to safe, quality care, whenever we can, wherever we are led, and with the support of all the partners who can lend us a hand.