A way with words: translating the tech at MTI Expo
Comtec - a specialist translation services provider is exhibiting at Med-Tech Innovation Expo for the first time this year. Comtec director, Sophie Howe explains why translation services can be crucial in medtech.
We have longstanding relationships with a wide range of manufacturers in the medical sector and have built up an experienced team of specialist medical translators to support them on global projects in more than 200 languages. It has been a pleasure to be a part of those companies’ success in international markets, and naturally we would like to help others do the same.
It’s an area that my team and I are seeing a lot of interest in and growth, and therefore Med-Tech Innovation Expo was a logical fit for us. We plan to further develop our medical translation services this year, so where better place to do this?
We are also members of Medilink UK and they provided the catalyst for getting us involved: we will be sharing Stand 50 with them and other members.
For me, MTI Expo is a great opportunity to get a finger on the pulse of the med-tech sector – sorry for the medical pun! I’m interested in finding out more about the challenges manufacturers face when exporting and growing their businesses overseas, and these insights will help us ensure our medical translation services are closely aligned with the sector.
Translations are often viewed as ‘another thing to do’ on the endless ‘to do’ list for a company launching a product into an international market; but success, or failure, could rest on the quality of their translations. There are key quality, compliance and patient safety considerations, but also user experience factors to bear in mind. Our clients report increased acceptance of products when user information and marketing material is translated into native languages. It also increases the usability of products and patient safety.
Regulatory changes are a considerable challenge for all healthcare and medical organisations. When driven by a plethora of local authorities, FDA (USA), CFDA (China), EU’s MDD, etc., it can be a minefield. I’ll be interested to hear from people visiting MTI Expo about how they manage their translations in respect to this, and also different language requirements country-by-country. Having worked closely with companies in this sector, we established an efficient and effective translation process, and I hope we can help others develop strategies for dealing with this ever-changing landscape.
Given the stringent regulations around medical product information, when choosing a translation partner it is essential to find a specialist provider: one that can demonstrate clearly their best practices for quality assurance. My advice would be to expect at the minimum specialist medical translators; access to local in-market experts to capture specialist knowledge; quality standard procedures in place; and the use of Translation Memory or terminological databases to ensure accuracy and consistency.
I think it’s an exciting time to be expanding into international markets, especially for the UK and Irish med-tech sectors. Although Brexit will have an impact - no doubt many at MTI Expo will have opinions on this - there are great opportunities to be had.
Translations fit across the entire product development lifecycle, from international R&D projects, through market research, patient focus groups, clinical trials, to compiling product literature, supporting training materials, software, labelling, and post-market feedback collection. Therefore, translations are a very important component of any international expansion strategy, and really should be on the agenda early in the planning stage.
At Comtec we do work to very tight deadlines at times, but ideally any manufacturer that is planning to launch overseas should start having conversations with translation service providers sooner rather than later. MTI Expo is certainly a good opportunity to talk to my team and I about this, and get a timeline for your translation projects.
I hope that this has given readers a little insight into medical translations and the importance of getting them right. If you would like to discuss any of the above in more detail, or have other questions about translations, please come and find the Comtec team on Stand 50.