What is Healthcare Translation?


Language barriers create significant challenges to providing effective and high-quality healthcare. Of all Americans 5 years of age and over, 60.6 million people (21%) speak a language other than English. In the United States, federal and state laws provide a framework to ensure healthcare access for individuals unable to speak English. Many healthcare institutions have access to interpreter services, and the availability of professional translators has been associated with improvements in patient satisfaction, communication, and overall healthcare access.



Whether you are providing advice about the winter flu season, or instructions on how to use a cardiac medical device, linguistically diverse populations need to receive critical health information in a language they can understand and speak. It has been established that poor access to medical information can result in serious danger to a patient’s health. Misunderstandings of medication dosage alone can and have resulted in patient deaths. Healthcare providers, insurance companies and pharmacies are required to offer language services for individuals with Limited English Proficiency (LEPs) in their native language. Medical and healthcare translation services are highly technical and demand the utmost accuracy.

Effective communication with patients about medical conditions and treatments can be as important as the diagnosis. In the United States, there are currently over 21 million people with limited English proficiency. These individuals are more likely to experience difficulties in understanding a medical situation, following treatment instructions, or even reading labels on medications. The consequences of miscommunication or misunderstandings can be very dangerous. Knowing the importance of this issue, many medical translation companies and agencies offer a variety of solutions so that each project is handled with the highest level of accuracy and service in the industry:
  • Translation of Medical Forms and Records
  • Bilingual Staffing
  • On-Site Interpretation
  • Over-the-Phone Interpreting
  •  Multilingual Typesetting 


Medical Translation Skill Requirements

Translating medical terminology and jargon becomes even more complex with the emergence of new diseases, treatments and therapies. As new global epidemics continue to challenge medicine, such as Zika and Ebola, they create a greater need for multilingual translation. However, since medical terminology is so broad, it’s inevitable that various problems will occur as translators attempt to create correct and corresponding translations across languages. Being a translator in the medical industry demands a deep understanding of medical vocabulary in two or more languages. Being bilingual doesn’t necessarily mean that someone will be able to translate medical jargon from one language to another because the terminology is not familiar to those outside of a particular profession. For instance, even someone with a background in cardiology may not be adequately fluent in the terminology specific to the field of oncology, especially in another language.

A good medical translator should have the following 3 capabilities:

  • Have a comprehensive knowledge and reasoning ability in the medical field being translated
  • Be able to read and understand the source language competently so that he/she understands the meaning of a particular text
  • Be able to accurately express the meaning of the translation in the target language

All 3 qualities are equally important, as each attribute is closely connected to one another in terms of understanding specific phrasing in different languages. Even if just one of the above mentioned skills is not performed, it will ultimately alter the translation process.
In order to provide the best possible healthcare to all patients and to mitigate potential liabilities, it is crucial that the translation of medical information be performed by highly skilled, experienced language specialists so that everyone can get the same and accessible information that they can easily understand.  

Location: New York, NY, USA

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