My friends treat me like I’m a pharmacist, which I don’t condone, of course, but they see me as an expert in medicine. I continuously increase my knowledge about the fields by attending webinars & online courses. My next goal is to get certified as a medical writer so I can help my clients even before the text is written.
My recent translation of a book on radionuclide therapy was the first book from Turkey to be accepted for publication.
I started translating in high school, when I switched to a language-focused programme. The content I translated then was very, very general, but I still think it counts because I owe my quick thinking and writing to that experience.
Then I met medicine, turns out it was written in the stars.
How does a hypochondriac become a medical translator?
I used to be infamous among friends for my hypochondria. The first medical content I translated was about a novel medicine for breast cancer. I thought, “Hey, there’s no way I can catch this. Good!” The next project I was involved was, again, about breast cancer… IN MEN. I seriously rethought about my professional choices. But, hey, there’s almost nothing good therapy can’t resolve. I’m now hypochondria-free, and you can send me any horrifying medical content for quality translation!
I’m also a specialist in machine translation
The texts in the field of medicine are perfect for machine translation, and I realized that from early on. MT also works very well in my language pair. So what did I do? I established a company called Pharmaling focusing on exactly that - MT solutions for pharmaceutical and medical device companies.
I will not use it unless you specifically ask for it, but the MT engine I use increases my speed and the quality of the target text. So I highly recommend!
Academia and industry meets in me
I’m currently pursuing a Master of Arts degree in translation in addition to my BA degree in translation, and my thesis is about cognitive and technical effort in machine translation. I’m comparing editing done on human translation and different MT engines.
My thesis took a little bit longer than expected, but I believe that academia and industry can complement each other, and I’m eager to continue my studies to help enlighten the process of postediting and the impact of MT.
I am excited about these new developments with the translation technology I use
MT, MT, and MT! It’ll revolutionize the translation industry, it already is. However, it should be used carefully. MT doesn’t mean cheaper translation. MT means that a higher specialization is required. It improves quality & speed but that’s about it. Well, turns out you still need me. Us. Specialized translators.