Medical trials are the key to any kind of progress. The problem is that depending on the trial, there aren’t enough participants. Participants that speak different languages aren’t able to join the trials, due to translation issues.
How Language Affects Medical Trials
Medical trials have a problem finding people because they can be risky and there isn’t a guarantee that it will help. But trials are the only way to know if medications or procedures are safe.
There are millions of immigrants that could be part of trials, but very few studies have translators.
This can be because some doctors are concerned about interpreters. There could be some key things that get lost in translation that can negatively affect the study.
Particularly Difficult in Alzheimer’s Trials
In particular, Alzheimer’s studies don’t include translators. These barriers are really noticeable by the amount of Spanish speaking people in the country. There are almost 6 million American seniors, 2.2 million are Spanish speaking and not good with English.
This will only get worse as the years go on. This is because the Hispanic population is growing.
Different ethnicities can be a scientific goldmine. It’s not know that all medicine will work on people of different ethnicities.
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