Medical Department

Luisa’s Medical Department has been operating since 1994. Marge (meditsiin@luisa.ee), the Head of Medical Translations, works with Estonian and foreign clients including hospitals, universities, pharmaceutical companies, pharmacies, research organisations and foundations. 30 years of experience translating life science and medical texts have provided us with the knowledge base that medical institutions, hospitals and health care providers require. Luisa will not only fulfil but exceed your expectations, especially when it comes to complying with deadlines, meeting complex demands and adhering to legislation.

Let’s get acquainted!

Besides their linguistic skills, our medical translators and editors are required to have broad-ranging knowledge experience. Each translator is a professional in their field – they are competent at translating texts as well as in the area of medical science. Many are either former or current doctors. Marge is highly satisfied with the team at her disposal. “Each translator has a field they are most competent in,” she says. “As such, selecting the right translator is an important decision, but when you’ve been working with exceptional translators for years, it’s thankfully not a difficult task.” The translation team includes language editors and designers in addition to translators with a medical background.

• Naturally, all translation orders are confidential, but a separate confidentiality agreement can be entered into.
• Luisa offers design and layout services, meaning translated files will look the same as the original and/or be print-ready.
• Luisa also offers Braille translation and checks.

Quality assurance

Our clients consider the work done by our Medical Department professional, our range of languages and services broad and our results fast and reliable. Luisa is very much client-focused, offering many convenient ways for you to evaluate your satisfaction regarding our translations. As such, we are able to improve the quality of our service for our clients with each subsequent order.

• The medical translation field is heavily regulated, which means we are always focused on quality management and assessment.
• Luisa provides certified medical translations.
• Luisa’s translation service is certified with the following standards:
  • ISO 9001:2015
  • ISO 17100:2015

Life science

The key areas of life science we translate on an everyday basis are anatomy, biochemistry, biological engineering and biomedical technology, biology, biomedicine, biometrics, biophysics, biopsychology, biostatistics, biotechnology, cardiology, cosmetology, dentistry, dermatology, endocrinology, epidemiology, gastroenterology, genetics, gynaecology, haematology, hepatology, immunology, medical devices, microbiology and bacteriology, mobility and rehabilitation, molecular biology, nephrology, neurology, neurosciences, nursing, nutritional science and nutrition, obstetrics, oncology, ophthalmology and optometry, otorhinolaryngology, paediatrics, pathology, pharmacology, radiology, rheumatology, toxicology, urology and virology.

Clinical trial translations

A clinical trial is when a medication is still in the trial phase (I–IV) and the translated material includes information about the trial as well as the patient’s informed consent form (meaning patients taking part in the trial are clearly informed about what it involves).

Accurate and punctual translations are essential in any case, but all the more so when it comes to clinical trial texts. Translations meeting existing regulations are guaranteed by using accepted vocabulary and ensuring the quality and accuracy of the content. Clinical trials are an essential part of the discovery and development of medications and diagnostic tests. Before a new medication or test is made available to the public, its safety and efficiency must be guaranteed. This is done via closely controlled and carefully monitored clinical trials to which patients must consent.

A large and steadily increasing number of clinical trials are being carried out in a number of countries simultaneously, and many of the medications marketed in Europe are developed and manufactured in other places. Because clinical trial translations have to be extremely accurate (since they pertain to people’s health), the accuracy of the translation is verified via reverse translation. This is always performed by a different translator, who is not allowed to access the original material, otherwise the point of the reverse translation (discovering errors) would be lost.

The text is first translated into the target language, then a different translator translates it back into the original language (generally English). The purpose of this is to compare the original text and the reverse translation to determine whether and how the texts differ or coincide. Ideally, the content of both versions should be the same and the wording as similar as possible for the translation to be verified.

Medical technology

The highly innovative medical technology industry is dedicated to developing medical devices and technologies. Documentation regarding medical devices includes information about medicine, technology, electronics, computer systems, software and more. This requires an approach suited to different types of text, as a number of completely different topics may be included in one and the same text. Such texts require the skills of qualified experts: a translator proficient in medical texts translates the text, which is then proofread by editors in the fields of medicine, medical devices and software. This approach allows us to appraise the quality of the translation at each stage of the process and to take all medical terminology and technical nuances into consideration.

Examples of fields covered by technical texts include anaesthesia and oxygen therapy equipment, ECG equipment, physiotherapy equipment, contraception, dentistry, electromedicine, in-vitro diagnostics, ophthalmology, orthopaedics, radiology, user manuals and software.

Registering medications
Pharmacy/Biotechnology

Translations are necessary in many phases of the registration of medications, from initial clinical trials and the presentation of clinical documents to manufacturing, advertising and packaging – which is to say every phase that has to be completed before a new medication can be launched on the market.

When manufacturing and marketing medications, the most important aspects are accurate terminology, reliable content and coherent style. As a result, translations in the pharmaceutical field must be allocated to specialist translators supported by editors and experts in the field. This guarantees that the translated texts will have the required terminology and accuracy and be compliant with the original material.

There are special rules for translating medication information which the translator and editor have to follow. These are found in the QRD TEMPLATE (Quality Review of Documents) file. Naturally, every translator and editor in our Medical Department has a copy of this file, which is occasionally updated and can be downloaded from the website of the European Medicines Agency (EMA). The file is available in various languages, as is the template pertaining to veterinary medications.

The materials in the file include labels, medication characteristics, letters to and from the EMA, product information, package leaflets, user manuals, training materials, informed consent forms, patient inclusion materials, information about prescriptions and pharmacological reports.

Veterinary medicine translations

The objectives of veterinary medicine, and indirectly of its translations, are the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of diseases among animals and animal care and nutrition generally. The exponential development of veterinary medicine in recent years has been the result of technological advances and has led to a need for multilingual translations of specialist literature, especially in the areas of livestock farming and health control.

We can meet all translation needs in the sphere of veterinary medicine thanks to our exclusive network of translators specialising in different branches of the field.

As is the case with human medications, veterinary medications are subject to QRD TEMPLATE files, which we always follow in our orders.

Health service translations

Our objective as a translation service provider is to help bridge the language gap between patients and organisations so as to provide high-quality health-related texts that are easy to read. We translate public and private hospital websites as well as all sorts of marketing materials. We can always lend a hand with uploading texts to your website, too.
In addition, we help patients with all types of translation needs, such as medical records, reports and certificates.

Medical translations can be finalised with validation on the part of the translation agency or as a certified translation.

We provide the translations for the following health service subcategories: medical records, medical reports, medical certificates, information materials for patients describing procedures/surgeries/disease conditions, questionnaires for patients, general texts about medicine or health, presentations and reports, scientific articles and educational materials (including books).