Medical translations: Why are they so important?

While we are living through a pandemic, it makes complete sense to talk about medical translations. If you have had to fly recently, you will certainly have had to translate your Covid-19 test results or make sure the airline or departure/destination countries will accept them.

However, when we talk about medical translations, we are talking about more than useful documents for patients. Returning to the new coronavirus as an example, we only need to recall that since the first cases were detected in China and the disease began to spread, we saw doctors, nurses, and scientists worldwide join forces to beat the virus. To succeed, it was essential to overcome the language barrier. Only this way could they collaborate and share treatments and vital information about the illness.

As well as translating test results (and exams and/or analyses), there are other kinds of documents in the health field that need to be translated. Here are some examples:

Medical consent forms
Documents relating to hospital admissions, such as discharges and medical justifications
Regulations and legislation related to medicine
Medical records
Clinical research, trials and studies
Clinical protocols
Medical reports and opinions
Scientific research
Scientific articles for publication in specialist magazines and journals

As we can see, not only do medical translations make it possible to report on an individual’s state of health, but they are also useful for sharing information internally and externally. It is also not limited to the field of human medicine. This service also includes the veterinary medical sector and the pharmaceutical industry.

For this reason, it falls into the technical translation category, which means the technical translator charged with this task must have some knowledge of the topic and be familiar with the terminology.

Given its content and the responsibility associated with this task, it is very important to contract translation service providers with a proven track record and industry experience.