Researcher: Susana Valdez (RG 6)
Project Designation: Health and Migration: Understanding the use of AI and machine translation in doctor-patient communication in the Netherlands
Funding Entity: Leiden-LUCL, Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC)
Principal Researcher: Susana Valdez
Research Unit: Leiden University
Partners:NOVA School of Social Sciences and Humanities
Duration: 2023-2024 (16 months)
Funding: 10000 euros
Overall description: The importance of equal access to health information ranks high in the UN’s key global issues. When patients cannot find the information in a language they can understand, they often turn to online machine translation (MT), such as Google Translate or DeepL.
The technology is easily accessible, apparently simple to use, and (mostly) free. However, users might not be aware of the pitfalls of using this technology. For instance, when using this automated translation to understand doctors’ advice on how to take a particular medicine, a user might be misled into believing a higher level of accuracy, which poses potential high risks to their health. In the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, the impact of MT and the implementation of MT literacy have come even more to the fore. MT was considered a vital resource for a rapid-response infrastructure allowing fast dissemination of information into a high number of languages.
MT literacy in healthcare contexts is hence essential. This comprehends acquiring knowledge of how MT works, understanding how to use it safely and ethically, and how to interpret the output accurately.
Aim of the project: Our research focuses on understanding how migrant communities living in the Netherlands use MT in health contexts. In this project, this will be done by collecting data through questionnaires and vignettes on when, how and why, and with what challenges MT is used by non-Dutch speakers. This is expected to serve as a proof of concept to build training material for this community.