Contact Us

Vital Blog

Return

What is VitalUNI?

At Vital Translations, we believe that in order to provide precise, high-quality and timely specialised medical and pharmaceutical translations, the translators in charge need not only be proficient in the language pair they work and have the professional translation studies, but also they need to have subject matter knowledge of the fields where they provide the translation services; that is, they need to know, at least, some basic concepts of medicine, pharmacology and the pharmaceutical industry.

What is VitalUNI?

VitalUNI is a training platform developed by Vital Translations.

It all started as an internal training platform for new Vital translators who were proficient in the language pair they worked with and had the required professional translation qualifications, but lacked the subject matter knowledge about medicine and pharmacology that would help them properly translate the highly technical and sensitive documents elaborated in the medical practice and the pharmaceutical industry.

Our senior specialised medical translators, conversant with all the stages of drug development and with the terminology of mandatory use in the industry, developed internal courses to address the need of an integral training in medical and pharmaceutical translation. These courses included not only medical and pharmaceutical terminology and where to find it, but concepts of chemistry, biology, anatomy and physiology, pharmacology, clinical research, and the pharmaceutical industry necessary to properly understand the texts we have to translate and accurately produce target language versions that comply with content, format and industry-required quality.

In 2026, Vital Translations will open the doors of its training platform to those translators working with the language pair English 🇬🇧 🇺🇸 into Spanish 🇪🇸 who want to specialise in medical and pharmaceutical translation, a field that even in the AI era still requires well-prepared and specialised translators.

What are the benefits of specialising in a training platform like VitalUNI?

VitalUNI offers integral specialised courses in medical and pharmaceutical translation. It means that you will not only learn about terminology, and the different useful and validated terminological resources you can use, but you will learn essential concepts of chemistry, biology, anatomy and physiology, pathology, pharmacology (pharmacokinetics, pharmacodynamics, toxicology), clinical investigation, and most importantly, concepts and data about the pharmaceutical industry that will help you properly approach the texts you have to translate, and translate them by interpreting the message not just by transferring one word in one language into the other language neglecting content and format like machines do.

Scientific texts in the medical and pharmaceutical fields have intricate characteristics that translators have to fully grasp to properly approach the source text and render it accurately in the target language.

Subject matter knowledge is key to generate accurate medical and pharmaceutical translations in a precise and timely manner. It also boosts the translator’s productivity since subject matter knowledge helps guide the terminological search because it provides a knowledge base that helps the translator understand the text it is working with.

Subject matter knowledge is also vital for translators to stand up to machine translation software and its supposedly “low cost” benefit. Specialised medical translators -a very rare species- will always be looked for the translation of highly complex medico-scientific texts because the different AI software is not performing quite well in this field.

And, regardless of whether you have to translate a highly complex medico-scientific text from scratch or do machine translation post-edition (MTPE) on a machine translation version, your subject matter knowledge and your experience of the real world will make the difference and will definitely help you get high competitive rates because, we, specialised medical translators, do not charge for what we do or the time it takes, we charge for what we know that the machine doesn’t. Remember that 😉.

Categories

Explore the Sectors

LABORATORIES

RESEARCH

MANUFACTURING

PROMOTION

COMMUNITY

PATIENTS

Are translation and interpretation the same kind of language service?

No. Although both translation and interpretation are language services that require the linguists in charge to be proficient in both the source language and the target language, have translation skills as well as subject matter knowledge on the topic they are working with and be accurate in conveying the tone and intent of the original message, these services serve different purposes. The translation service implies working with written text. Translators work with different types of documents to be printed, published online or even exchanged with other people. The interpretation service implies working with speech; that is, spoken text. Interpreters can work in situ, for example, in meetings, congresses, seminars, over the phone or via videocall. Whether you need a translation service or an interpretation service, always trust certified professional linguists.

No. The translation of regulatory documentation requires in-depth knowledge of the source and target regulatory affairs as well as of the terminology of mandatory use in the pharmaceutical industry to provide high-quality and timely translations and help avoid delays during drug authorisation and registration processes. The translation of advertising materials requires subject matter knowledge plus a touch of creativity, a combination of translation and copywriting skills to transfer the creative language —generally lost during a direct translation— into the target language to achieve the desired response from the target audience.

Yes. The desktop publishing (DTP) service can be provided as an integrated part of the translation process or as an independent service. In the first case, the client sends us the file for translation, and we then deliver a translated file that keeps the integrity of the original design. In the second case, the client sends the linguistic content and the specifications for page layout and a team of experts in the field of desktop publishing generates page layouts and produces printed or digital materials using DTP software. In both cases, we can advise the client on professional output aligned with the target language’s visual layout and design requirements.

Yes. The method for establishing translation rates is based on source word count, language pair, complexity of the document, project volume and urgency of delivery. When clients contact us to get a quote, we analyse the file(s) to determine total word count and the complexity of the file(s) and we also take into account the language pair; for example, if it is English into Spanish, or Spanish into English. Special discount rates may apply in big-volume projects and extra “rush charges” may apply in the case of urgent deliveries.

Yes. To be able to provide a quote, we first need to analyse the file(s) to determine the word count, the complexity and the translation steps that would be involved in the whole translation process; that is, we need to evaluate whether there is non-editable text that needs to be converted into editable text to be translated, determine the total word count to estimate the translation time and delivery date, and assess whether the file(s) require desktop publishing (DTP). To be able to provide an accurate quote, we need to see and analyse the file(s).