Medical Translation Insight

The intersection of consumer electronics and medical technology is quickly emerging as vast new market: Current products fall far short of consumers' expectations and the market is growing quickly.

The Wall Street Journal's Walt Mossberg famously referred to his glucose meter as "a piece of crap", based on 1977-era technology. A developer who "showed this to Steve Jobs [would] be fired immediately," he said.

But while there is near-universal agreement on the sad state of current personal diabetes care, things they are a-changing.

Walt Mossberg himself gave Bayer's Contour a positive review. Companies are racing to develop iPhone-based glucose meters; a recent example is the iBGStar glucose meter by sanofi-aventis. And diabetes patients who enjoy the occasional game of Super Mario Bros can use their Nintendo DS as a glucose meter.

It's a good thing that new and better products are coming to market. The CDC just released a report that expects diabetes to double or triple in the U.S. by 2050. That would mean that as much as 1/3 of the U.S. population suffers from diabetes.

Can you say healthcare crisis? Can you hear the cha-ching of sky-rocketing glucose meter sales?


ForeignExchange Translations supports leading diabetes care and blood glucose monitoring system companies with specialized medical translation services for packaging, IFUs, and clinical research. Contact us to learn more.
 
 

István Lengyel of Kilgray is in town for the ATA conference and to assist in our roll out of memoQ Server. He spent a day in our Louisville office, and I had a chance to catch up with him.

I was surprised to learn that Kilgray has only been in business for five years. Their products have gained so much traction in the marketplace, that I had assumed that their beginnings traced back further.

In chatting with István about Kilgray's success, he attributed it to several technology aspects but one business factor stood out: "We are everything that SDL is not."

He went on to explain how Kilgray doesn't look to beat SDL at their game - they have too much scale, the advantage of a decade-long lead in the industry, and are well entrenched in many sectors. Instead, István described how Kilgray finds opportunities in segments that are under-served by SDL and exploits them by offering better technology, better service, and better value.

This really resonated because that's exactly ForeignExchange's strategy against the 800-pound gorillas in our "room". In fact, rather than be afraid of their sheer size, the differences between us work to our advantages.

Let me illustrate this with a comparison between ForeignExchange and Lionbridge, our favorite competitor:

The list of differences goes on but the message stays the same - pure size doesn't matter in the medical translation space. What's important is that medical translation suppliers have the team, expertise, and service offering to assist clients consistently and predictably. And on those counts, ForeignExchange is everything that our competition is not.


ForeignExchange Translations provides specialized medical translation services for regulatory, marketing, and clinical groups at pharmaceutical and medical device companies. Contact us to find out more.

There is a long, long list of benefits to knowing more than one language.

Beyond the obvious communication advantages, bilingual people benefit from a wider choice of jobs at a higher pay, from character advantages (increased self-esteem from being able to talk to people in different languages), cultural advantages, and cognitive advantages.

It is this last category that just received a big boost from recent Canadian studies that showed that the act of speaking two or more languages allows those people to better deal with the early symptoms of Alzheimer's and other memory-robbing diseases.

According to Building a More Resilient Brain in The Wall Street Journal:

A lifetime of speaking two or more languages appears to pay off in old age, with recent research showing the symptoms of dementia can be delayed by an average of four years in bilingual people.

Knowing this, should you rush out to learn as many languages as possible to affect further delays?

Well, first off all, speaking two languages isn't a silver bullet. It doesn't prevent Alzheimer's, it only delays it's average onset. And while researchers know that being bilingual is helpful, they aren't sure that being multilingual does anything more.

So instead of trying to beat dementia with multiple languages, do a daily crossword puzzle or delay your retirement.


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In too many organization, translations are not properly integrated into larger processes. This "silo treatment" of translations leads to unnecessary hand-offs and touch points, which, in turn, increase the risk for error as well as overall costs and turnaround times. And in this age of doing more with less, that's not good business.

In the medical translation space, ForeignExchange's product life cycle approach offers medical device and pharmaceutical companies the opportunity to streamline translations along a product's development, submissions, manufacturing, and selling path.

It's been interesting to note that Xerox is taking a similar approach in the manufacturing space. The company has been running a large-scale campaign to advertise its relationship with Ducati. The core message is that by combining document authorship, translation, and printing, Ducati is saving time and money.

Xerox, which has a $100+ million translation business, is spending big bucks on the campaign - the company will more than double its ad budget compared to last year.

The campaign features print ads like this one in The Wall Street Journal, sponsorship of Ducati's World Superbike Championship team, and funny TV commercials like this one:



Will the message resonate? It's too early to tell but it will be interesting to see if an increasing number of clients will start to de-silo their translation efforts.


ForeignExchange Translations provides specialized medical translations for regulatory, marketing, and clinical groups at pharma and device companies. Contact us to find out more.

Guest article:
By Roomy Naqvy
Gujarati-English-Hindi translator
Contact him via proz.com

[This guest article is in response to our poll Refusing translations on ethical, moral, political, or religious grounds?]

You might not recollect but in 2002, there were "riots" (as the Indian government put it) in Gujarat, an Indian state. In fact, what happened was a systematic massacre of Muslims after a train containing 58 Hindus was burned. It went on and on. Now, my Dad was working then and he was with the media. I am a half Muslim and a half Zoroastrian and my Dad has been a socialist. We have been liberal at our house with strong family values. We were cosmopolitan at home.

In 2002, the three English newspapers I got at my house and the English and Hindi national electronic media were criticizing the government of Gujarat for not stopping the killing of Muslims but the two Gujarati newspapers that I received at my house (from which I translated news stories and edits ) went on stating that the killing of Muslims was justified and that it happened because the 58 Hindus were killed. In fact, more than 3,000 Muslims were killed. The official figures would be in the range of 1500 deaths.

I stopped translating from the Gujarati newspapers because I wanted to keep my sanity. I was never the "religious right", nor was I a "Marxist left" -- I was the centrist. But I realized the documents that I had to translate were so biased that I couldn't do so.

Then, in 2004 or so, I got a document for translation, which showed how right-wing Hindu outfits received funds from the U.S. in the name of an earthquake or at Thanksgiving time -- and then used that money for spreading hate. I told the person who gave me the translation that I might be a bit subjective in translating it and so, he could ask someone else to do so. But he said, go ahead. I was mature enough to do a thoroughly objective translation, without trying to side with the people who wrote the document against militant/extremist Hindu groups. In any case, I was never communal and am not even now.

But those are always sensitive issues and I really think the fact that we choose to translate such texts always shows us -- how strong we are. See, if you and I don't translate it, someone always will, and that someone might hold a rather incorrect view of things, of life, of world and that can create further problems.

I have clearly ethical problems with pornography, for instance. But if I got a chance to translate it, I would like to do it at least once because it would expose me to the challenges of a linguistic kind that I might have to encounter. I guess the only kind of documents I might refuse would be pornography.

Nothing else.

Oh yes, I guess I wouldn't be working for a terrorist organization, which is another matter.


ForeignExchange's METRiQ quality system provides medical device and pharmaceutical companies with known translation quality - on every technical translation assignment.
 
 

Still today, a lot of medical device software is not designed with translation or localization in mind. Inevitably, this will result in target-language text being cut off, awkward lined-up or hyphenated, or not render properly.

Software internationalization is an important but often neglected step in the development process.

And the same is true for pseudo-translations. If used properly, pseudo translations provide an inexpensive yet effective sanity test for the "localizability" a software application.

Yet we all know how tempting it is to skip pseudo-translations (and, for that matter, internationalization). But before you rationalize skipping these steps with "cost savings" or "lack of time", here are a couple of great quotes from the Localization Project Management Log to keep you on the straight and narrow:

"I always regret having to pseudo-translate, because it involves an extra step, annoys the engineers, and generally slows things down. BUT, whenever I don't pseudo-translate, I regret it even more."

And:

"...try to flush out ugly problems when time is cheap, rather than when it gets expensive."

This is great advice for pseudo-translation, for internationalization, and for project management in general.

For more on pseudo-translation and software internationalization, take a look at the following:

• The Theory and Practice of Pseudo-Translation [PDF] draws on the real-world experiences from Yahoo!
• Software internationalization in action gives an overview of the practice
• Internationalization isn't just for software as Preparing training courses for international markets shows
• Inter-Locale provides a simple dedicated Pseudo-Translate tool to generate non-ASCII data from ASCII strings - handy.

ForeignExchange's METRiQ quality system provides medical device companies with measurable, known software localization quality. To learn more about our medical translation solutions, contact ForeignExchange Translations.
 
 

Similis is a little-known translation memory (TM) tool that's about to become more widely known. If you haven't heard about Similis, you know have a good reason to check it out: Lingua et Machina has decided to make Similis available free of charge.

Similis is a full-featured computer-aided translation tool. Some of its stand-out features are a robust linguistic analysis and alignment engine and "chunk" technology to break segments into intelligent terminological groups generate glossaries.

"Free" is all the reason many linguists will need to give Similis a try. But challenges remain. For one thing, documentation is available but only in French. So, fire up Google Translate and give Similis a try.

[Hat tip to Jost Zetzsche's Tool Kit.]

You might also enjoy the following articles:

• What you need to know about translation memories provides an overview of translation memories, text alignment, and some of the pros and cons in the technology.
• Regardless of the TM tool used, the question remains: 100% text repetitions: To review or not to review.
• L10Nworks is a repository of translation and localization freeware/shareware tools.

ForeignExchange Translations provides specialized medical translation services to pharmaceutical, biotechnology, and medical device companies.
 
 

At ForeignExchange, we spend a lot of time thinking about our clients. What do they need? How can we improve our services for them? What can clients do to help us be more efficient, which will ultimately benefit them?

Over the years, we have found that educating clients is not a one-way street. We cannot do it all alone, even with the best intentions. For real innovation and productivity enhancements to happen, both parties need to be intimately familiar with each others' businesses.

This quote captures this sentiment, and our approach, perfectly:



The quote is from The Great Game of Business by Jack Stack and Bo Burlingame, as quoted on shmula.


For expert medical translations of technical content in 40 languages, request a detailed proposal from ForeignExchange Translations.
 
 

We are used to last names being difficult to pronounce but the same thing can be true for company names.

The Pharma Marketing Blog recently ran a good example of this: How DO You Pronounce "Boehringer Ingelheim"? reports on the pronunciation challenges of a top-20 pharma company.

If you speak German, it's easy to pronounce "Boehringer Ingelheim". But for others? Not so much.

Here is a word pictogram to help English speakers:



Naming products and companies for a flat world is notoriously difficult. It seems like the pharma business has more than its share of hard-to-pronounce names. bioMérieux anyone? How about Eisai and Reckitt Benckiser? And let's not even get started on the pronouncability of drug names...


ForeignExchange Translations provides specialized medical translations for clinical research - from patient recruitment to ICFs to diaries, ForeignExchange supports sponsors in 40+ languages. Contact us for more information.
 
 

September marked several "firsts" for our audio conference effort:

We added our first-ever energy-related topic. This is an area that we will grow in the months to come.

The newly introduced AC 2010 Pass provides access to all live events and recordings for the rest of 2010, all for $499.

Beckloff Associates is our featured FX Certified Partner of the month. This rotating program will highlight some of our most valuable audio conference partners.

And amidst all of this, we managed to produce some great events too. In case you missed them, here are the top five audio conferences for September:

1. Understanding the Connection Between Adverse Events and Product Liability Claims
2. Statistical Concepts of Medical Device Process Validation
3. CGMP Guidance for Phase 1 Clinical Supplies
4. Electronic Drug Establishment Registrations and Drug Listings – One Year Later
5. Establishing Win-Win Relationships With Internal Clients

If you would like to become an FXConferences speaker, send us a note!

Interested in other popular educational events? Take a look at the top events for August, July, June.


For a detailed proposal on your next clinical, regulatory, or marketing medical translation assignment, contact ForeignExchange Translations.

Since 2005, marketing authorization holders of medicines are required to have the patient information leaflets (PILs) for their products readability tested.

European Directive 2004/27/EC [PDF link] defines it as follows:

The package leaflet shall reflect the results of consultations with target patient groups to ensure that it is legible, clear and easy to use' (art. 59-3)

and

The results of assessments carried out in cooperation with target patient groups shall also be provided to the competent authorities (art. 61-1)

But as is of the case with many Directives, there is no absolutely clear information on how readability tests should be performed.

The regulatory authorities want to ensure that PILs were tested in a professional manner and that patients would be able to find the requested information, understand it and act appropriately. Most providers of readability test services use the method that is described in the revised (2009) EC Readability Guideline:

At least 90% of test participants should be able to find the requested information, and of those again, 90% should understand the information.

But as the European Directive uses terms such as "readable", "clear", and "understandable", it is still not totally clear how readable a leaflet has to be.

One of the experts on this topic is Simon Andriesen of MediLingua. His presentation Readability Testing for Patient Information in Europe sheds light on many of the difficult, hands-on issues faced by practitioners:

• Where and how to recruit "average persons"
• Formulating testing questions
• Test score differences between men and women, old and young, education levels
• Using readability testing for other types of documents

If you are at all connected with QRDs, pharmaceutical labeling, or, usability testing, be sure to listen in!


ForeignExchange Translations provides specialized medical translations for electronic as well as paper-based regulatory submissions. Contact us to find out more.
 
 

In addition to expanding our U.S. footprint, ForeignExchange is also expanding in Europe.

Early next year, we will complement our terrific team members in Spain by opening a new UK office (Bucks/Herts). We are starting the process of looking for experienced, dynamic professionals to join our company:

Strategic Account Managers
Working in a team environment, you will be supported by one of the best sales and operations teams in the industry. You will have the opportunity to:

• Manage relationships with assigned medical device client
• Carefully prepare client proposals and quotations
• Develop account management and growth strategies
• Reconcile client requirements with operational constraints to develop high-value client proposals

Sr. Project Managers
The project manager is a key person in ForeignExchange's efforts to support leading drug and device companies. In this demanding role, you will:

• Be focused on client satisfaction
• Help build our company by improving service-delivery processes, client relationships, and technologies
• Lead
• Innovate and contribute to process improvements

When you are ready to make a difference, email your CV and compelling cover letter to co-careers ~at~ fxtrans.com.


Follow the leader in medical translation on Twitter: @fxtrans
 

Catherine Guilliaumet, one of our loyal readers, also finds time to moderate the Yahoo! medical translation group. The other day, she the following morsel to the list:

I just want to let you know that, as a sort of result of the ProZ Virtual Conference which took place on Sept. 30th, a lot of medical translators having expressed their wish to have a forum dedicated to their specialization provided by ProZ, we have obtained it and it is now open!

Do not hesitate to join your colleagues for any discussion pertaining to Medical Translation. at the following URL: www.proz.com/forum/medical-986.html

Sounds very interesting!

In addition to checking out the new proz.com forum, make sure you also subscribe to the medical translations groups on Yahoo!, LinkedIn, and on the Watercooler.

[Thanks a lot, Catherine!]


ForeignExchange supports clients' medical translation needs with comprehensive terminology management services and technology. Contact us to find out more!
 
 

Seattle on a beautiful, sunny day (do these words go together?) - what a way do start off Localization World Seattle 2010 last Wednesday. The pre-conference day featured a number of roundtables focused on 5 different tracks.

The medical roundtable claimed a full house, split roughly 50-50 between suppliers and clients from major drug and device companies. One of the highlights was the presentation by Beth Trippe from Abbott Medical Optics. Beth discussed her personal journey at Abbott, and how she slowly and systematically improved the technical writing processes in her division.

Beth's goal was not only to streamline technical writing per se but ultimately to be able to deliver translated products with much shorter timeline and better quality. Going from a painful, resource intensive, error-prone process to an efficient repeatable and cost-effective one meant that internal teams had to be trained about localization, glossaries put in place, documentation strategies had to be revised and authoring as well as translation technologies had to be evaluated and implemented. All and all it took four years and some capital investment but the results speak for themselves with reduced translations costs, better quality and shorter turn-around times!

The day also featured presentations on the special requirement inherent to the life sciences translation business, terminology management, and the RFP process from both client and vendor perspective. The discussion around RFPs was lively and ultimately provided an excellent forum for all to express their challenges and frustration, especially about the lack of background regarding the client and their translation needs.

Even with some of our competitors playing petty at the event, this was another terrific Medical Localization Roundtable and Localization World!


ForeignExchange Translations provides specialized medical translation and software localization services to medical device companies. Contact us to learn more.
 
 

Every four weeks, we take a look at the most read articles for the previous month. During September, our posts have been more focused on translation-industry topics. Not surprisingly, those are the articles that were the most widely read.

So here they are, the articles that received the most attention last month:

1. Challenge yourself, do something exciting - Do you want to make a difference? Apply here...
2. memoQ, here we come! - We are very pleased with our implementation of memoQ TM server
3. What's the difference between Helvetica and Arial? - Is that a trick question?
4. Budgeting for translation: how not to blow it - 'Tis the season for budgeting, forecasting, and planning
5. Legal terminology in Italian, English, French, Spanish - A good terminology resource for legal translators

Looking for more great stuff to read? Take a look at our top articles for August, July, and June. Happy reading and happy weekend!

Guess how many languages there are in the world? A few hundred? A thousand? How about 6,909!

Well, now it's 6,910 counting a new unique language that's been discovered in the linguistic hotbed of northern India. The new tongue, called Koro, is only spoken by about 1,000 people and had it not been discovered now, might have disappeared. Koro is considered an endangered language, with its dwindling numbers of speakers, and linguistic researchers are scrambling to record and document the language in the hopes of preserving and studying it.

As the Associated Press reports, Koro was discovered in the Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh, in the foothills of the Himalayas. The rugged terrain and remote communities that are there contribute to the diversity of languages in the region. Small populations would migrate, settle and then live in virtual isolation from other cultures, forming their own vocabulary and grammar over hundreds and thousands of years. Though the speakers of Koro are technically part of the Aka culture, the language is not a mere dialect but strikingly different from the Aka language.

No word yet on linguistic rates for translating English to Koro. Stay tuned.

For more information on linguistic diversity and endangered languages, check out this interesting link.


ForeignExchange Translations translates in over 60 languages (and counting) for top drug and device companies.
 

• Avoid slang. Translation is not always clear.
• Keep it simple. Avoid using big words when a small one will do. And be aware that in some cultures the word “yes” might mean “yes,” “maybe” or even “no.” Restate the question so it does not require a “yes-no” answer.
• Speak slower, not louder. It’s embarrassing how many of us, in conversation with someone whose native language is different from our own; speak louder as though that will make us more understandable. Instead, slow down the pace a little, and give the other person extra time to comprehend what you’re says.
• If you’ve agreed on action items or next steps, review them carefully as a way of confirming that everyone understands what will happen next.
• Be patient. This is especially important for US stakeholders who believe that “time is money.” Quick and timely responses are not international norms, even among international offices of US-based organizations. 

Of course, part of the charm and excitement of working in a global company are the differences and difficulties themselves and an ability to laugh at our "faux pas" and mistakes can actually help bond a team. Remember to keep a sense of humor and keep on learning.


ForeignExchange is a global medical translation company, with offices in the U.S., Canada, and Spain.

Languages do not exist independently of the people, families, and communities that use them. For languages to survive and thrive, they must be integrated into the lives of their speakers.

One of the countries that's realizing this is Kazakhstan - a country and language that is largely unknown outside its region. The world is gradually becoming aware of Kazakhstan, largely thanks to its oil, a growing economy, and, yes, even Borat.

Kazakh is the official language. Russian is also an official language in Kazakhstan; it has been designated as the "language of inter-ethnic communication" and is used in much of the government and in everyday business.

in the late 1920s, Soviet policy dictated that Kazakh writing, along with that of other Turkic languages of the USSR, shift from Arabic to Latin letters. This was the first of two fundamental breaks that affected Kazakh; the second, a decade after Latinization, was the shift to modified versions of the Russian Cyrillic alphabet.

In October 2006, Kazakhstan's President brought up the topic of using the Latin alphabet instead of the Cyrillic alphabet as the official script for Kazakh. A Cyrillic-Latin alphabet change is not a new concept in the region. Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan -- whose languages belong to the same Turkic language group as Kazakh, and who also had Cyrillic imposed on them when part of the Soviet Union -- have already switched back to the Latin script.

But why change alphabets?

Along with the usual arguments (in particular, promoting the country's integration into the global economy), officials have argued that a Latin alphabet could help Kazakhstan forge a more cohesive national identity, moving it out from under Russia's shadow.

One of the most notable facts about Kazakhstan is that the public is well aware of the role of language and ethnic identity in social, cultural, and political life. This understanding of the need for equilibrium between linguistic role and identity repertoires has helped to develop policies on ethnicity and language which are more or less even-handed and conciliatory.

For more details, read our entire article on Associated Content.


ForeignExchange is on Twitter - follow us at @fxtrans!
 
 

We've written before about Website localization, how companies are trying to connect with the public and their customers and how to reach Hispanics online. Last week, I attended an informative presentation that wrapped up all of these concepts. The talk was given at the Minnesota Interactive Marketing Association annual conference by Joe Kutchera, an expert on online marketing to Hispanics.

Kutchera, a marketing veteran who worked for companies like Time Warner and CNN, has recently written a book that presents lessons learned in his career marketing to Hispanics as well some case studies that demonstrate that marketing to Hispanics is not as simple as translating content into Spanish. The book, "Latino Link: Building Brands Online with Hispanic Communities and Content", is a must-read for marketers who hope to draw in the steadily growing Hispanic population in the U.S.

According to Kutchera, by 2015, almost 40 billion Hispanics will be active Internet users. And that's in the U.S. alone. He also pointed out the oft-overlooked fact that Spanish speakers from Mexico and Central and South America are looking for online content in Spanish. Often times, these cross-border surfers aren't finding what they want and end up on sites originating in Spain.

In many Hispanic households in the U.S., it is the younger generation, the kids who are most Web-savvy and therefore serve as conduits for information gathering for others. Also, because there is far more content in English than in Spanish for American Web users, children's English skills are better due to growing up in English neighborhoods and schools.

One great takeaway from "Latino Link" is that Hispanics tend to form and value strong communities. This can be a key learning point for marketers using social media to reach its customers. By leveraging this community aspect and providing the right content in Spanish can draw Hispanics in, build loyalty and spread the word to others. Building this loyalty takes time and the companies who have been successful at it have maintained their commitment and focus over years.

Kutchera's presentation, and his book provide many more valuable anecdotes, best practices, case studies and demographics than can fit in this blog. For more reading on the topic, check out Kutchera's own blog.


Need expert web localization services for your medical device and pharmaceutical company? Ask ForeignExchange Translations for a quote.

We don't maintain a blog roll here are at Medical Translation Insight but we do get asked for recommendations for other blogs related to translation and language.

The good news is that since we started our little blog 18 months ago, there has been a tremendous increase in good writing and information in our industry. The bad news is that some of these news blogs lack staying power.

For a comprehensive reading list, start by looking at Lexiophiles' list of Top 100 Language Blogs. There are many terrific resources and some really good writers on that list. (Our own blog has made the list for the second time running in 2010.)

The 30 or so blogs that we follow aren't limited to Lexiophiles' list. Some of our favorites include:

• Global by Design - John Yunker is a 10-year industry veteran, published author, and THE authority when it comes to international web design. Plus, he's got interesting stories.
• Global Watchtower - Common Sense Advisory's blog is our preferred way to keep tabs on the pulse of the industry.
• Thoughts on Translation - Corinne McKay is a freelance translator who somehow finds time to write an educational, fun blog. Thank goodness for that!
• GTS Blog - Dave Grunwald writes on a variety of topics, not all of them translation-related. Dave is not afraid to voice his opinion.
• GITS Blog - The same is true for Ryan Ginstrom. I love his perspective after living in Japan for the past 10+ years.
• Johnson - The Economist's new blog provides a refreshing look at language. And they don't mince words.
• Translation Tribulations - Speaking of not mincing words, Kevin Lossner doesn't worry about using his translation technology/practices blog to pick a fight and presenting his views.
• Übersetzungsfehler - The self-proclaimed "translation gallery of horrors" is always good for a laugh. In German.

(A couple of blogs that are great but have been really quiet lately are Mox's Blog and T&I Business. Hopefully, they'll re-emerge soon.)

All of these terrific blogs share some common characteristics: They are written by knowledgeable people who aren't afraid to share insight and express an opinion. Plus, they get updated regularly. It would be great to see more of this in our industry.

Happy Friday - and happy reading!


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